February 6 - 12

Section: 

IMAGE(https://www.gamerswithjobs.com/files/pictures/pictures/picture-13445.jpg)   Felix “Squawkin’ on the Moon” Threepaper

Welcome folks, and happy “129th Anniversary of the crown cork bottle opener” week!

On 6 February 1894, inventor William Painter was granted his patent for the world’s first bottle opener. He had already invented the crown cork bottle cap, which is not made of cork, but is the crimped metal top that you see on many a beer and soda bottle these days. The opener was a metal tool with a mouth to catch and lever off the bottle cap. Before the invention of the crown cork bottle cap, carbonated beverages were sealed with actual corks, which meant they could not be stored upright. If they were, the corks would dry out and shrink, and the gas inside would cause them to pop out, hence the term “soda pop”. Manufacturers of cork-stoppered soda bottles often made them with rounded bottoms, to discourage upright storage. You may all celebrate by playing a game where every item has far too much backstory.

The elephant in the room this week is Hogwarts Legacy, an open-world action RPG set in the wizarding world created by JK Rowling a century before the events of the Harry Potter books.

I’m guessing most GWJers would be aware of the problems with JK Rowling, which have been well-canvassed by now. I don’t have anything to add, except to tap the sign that sets out GWJ’s values.

In light of those values, Hogwarts Legacy is completely, consciously, off the radar. I can’t get past all the baggage to dig into whether this is actually a good game or not. Some may argue that the hundreds of people who worked on the game can’t all be problematic, so why should they be punished? Firstly, they got paid already. Secondly, that argument implies that we are duty-bound to buy every game just because bigotry and capitalism screw people in so many intersectional ways. If we can’t vote with our dollar, then what’s left?

It may be easier for me to be this dismissive because the Potterverse holds no particular magic for me. I was too old for it to be a sacred childhood text—I read and watched it begrudgingly at the time, because it was everywhere, and everyone else was. When you’re on the outside of a fandom looking in, it’s all a bit culty and weird.

So, what else is out this week? Nothing in the AAA space because the big publishers did not want to go up against Hogwarts Legacy.

Prison Tycoon: Under New Management is a console port of a tycoon series that baffles me as to how it’s still going.

Perseverance: Complete Edition is a series of 3 horror/thriller visual novels set in a zombie apocalypse and very inspired by The Walking Dead. You play as a man in Part 1, a woman in Part 2, and can choose to play as either in Part 3. Your choices throughout the series will track and influence the plot across all 3 games. Part 1 is free to play on Steam right now if you want a taste.

Betty & Earl is a block-sliding puzzle game about reuniting two people. This theme of connection pervades the game: you move the characters’ blocks on a grid to connect them on a particular square, but everything else in the world is connected too, and moves when you move your blocks. It starts simple and gets increasingly complex as more elements are added, as most good puzzle games do.

Go! Go! PogoGirl is a console port of a retro-pixelated platformer that looks like it would have been bundled in with a Sega Master System in 1986 to compete with Super Mario Bros. The soundtrack is very chill.

Daily Dadish is another platformer. It’s also releasing on mobile and is designed as a ‘daily check in’ kinda game. It has 365 levels, with each level only being available to play for one day of the year. It’s like Wordle, but for platforming. You are a radish who is a dad, and apparently there have been a few Dadish platformers before this one. One of the dot-points in the promo materials is: “dialogue that is reasonably funny”. I love it when a game doesn’t oversell itself!

Scorchlands is a colony sim where you are an advanced chicken species building a technomagic colony on a volcanic moon. It’s set on a hexagonal grid, and you build buildings on tiles around a city centre, aiming for tiles with the best bonuses like in Civ or the Endless games. It’s mostly about collecting and refining resources and linking your colonies together as you build logistics networks. There is some combat, as monsters will occasionally threaten your colonies. I guess it wouldn’t be colonisation without indigenous lifeforms to destroy. But in this game, the combat is so vestigial that it makes you wonder if the devs put it in just because they think that that’s what the genre demands. It’s got combat the way Stardew Valley has combat. Everything else about the game indicates it’s a ‘peaceful building sim’—there’s no time limit, rival colonists, or other external pressures as you terraform the crap out of everything until the whole moon is covered in buildings, Coruscant-style.

Barkhan is an RTS that has been compared to the venerable Dune II. Three factions on a desert planet, fighting over materials, each with their own unique buildings and units? And occasionally giant Sand Snakes pop up and wreak havoc? I can’t see the comparison myself.

Weird and Unfortunate Things Are Happening is an indie, modern-day JRPG made on RPGmaker. It’s got a very Stranger Things-adjacent plot about a whole town taken over by an Eldritch horror, although you’re a group of adults trying to save the kids. Your characters roam a 2D Zelda-type overworld, punctuated by turn-based combat that resembles Pokemon battles. It’s also got survival elements. I was surprised to find that it already has a Wiki, but this is because it’s actually been available to play since 2020 and this week is just the Steam release.

Given the discussions on the recent Conference Call about rhythm games, here’s another one: Re:|THM - once upon a time. The hook here is that you are going backwards in time. You start at the end of the story and progress to the beginning, Memento-style. I can’t say much beyond that, because all the promo videos were in Japanese.

It’s a hard week to pick a GOTW. Barkhan looks well-made but I don’t RTS any more. Scorchlands is more my bag—maybe plonking buildings down on a hex grid on an alien moon will make me forget that Alpha Centauri isn’t getting the Civ 6 treatment anytime soon.

Here's the list, in release-date AND alphabetical order!

PC

  • 02-06

  • A Foreign World
  • Absorb
  • Ancient Guardians: The Dragon
  • Banana Attack VR
  • Boundary Walls
  • Engineering - Mystery of the ancient clock
  • F1 Crazy Stunts
  • House of the Soul
  • LightFall
  • LoFi Hotel
  • Mountain Alpaca
  • Raffucus Piedron: The Ancient Hero
  • Secret Dimension
  • Skyemont Adventure
  • Spikair Volleyball
  • Star Survivor - Prologue
  • TankLab
  • The Utility Room
  • Weird and Unfortunate Things Are Happening
  • Winter Survival: Prologue
  • Yggdra Union
  • 02-07

  • A Travers Le Temps
  • Gemscape
  • Keeper Of The Valley
  • Moving in with My Step-sister
  • Nixxsz Castle
  • PIP XL
  • Scorchlands
  • Street Lords
  • Under the Sky World~Another~
  • You Can Do!mino
  • 02-08

  • CryptoZoo
  • Daily Dadish
  • Drawing From Memory
  • Fight & Crush
  • Full Moon Kit
  • Lockes The Thief
  • Man 2
  • Man 3: The Social Media Wars
  • Otome Legends
  • Prizma Puzzle Prime
  • Re:|THM - once upon a time
  • Sky Rider
  • Sunrider 4: The Captain's Return
  • Tower Walker: MMO Grind Simulator
  • Violet Wisteria
  • Wipe Factor
  • 02-09

  • Barkhan
  • Changeling Charade
  • Garbage Truck Simulator
  • Hide and Seek
  • Lillusion
  • Mystic Gate
  • Riboud and fairies
  • SUBNET - Escape Room Adventure
  • Sweets Pusher Friends
  • TAL: Arctic 5
  • Taxi Driver Simulator: Car Parking
  • Who Run The City: Multiplayer
  • Winnie The Pooh: The Serial Killer
  • 02-10

  • ABROAD CLIMBING SIMULATOR
  • ARIA: Genesis
  • Betty & Earl
  • Bumblebee - Little Bee Adventure
  • Cyber Miner
  • Drift Experience Japan
  • E30 Drift Car Simulator
  • Hidden Mars
  • Hogwarts Legacy
  • Loot Express Delivery Service
  • Mayhem Heroes
  • Merge Me!
  • Mimicry (Voyde Studios)
  • Moxie's Lemon
  • Need Know What Know
  • One Eleven
  • Planet Achelous
  • Polar Bear Game
  • Ryo The Haunted Office
  • Sakura Battle
  • SATUS
  • Seroutte
  • Spider Hunter
  • The Maiden, the Butler, and the Witch
  • 02-12

  • Amber Trail
  • Anekoi Gokko - Siblings Role-play -
  • Baldy Bounce
  • Dragon Abyss
  • Mistcaller
  • Mr. Mat Hematic
  • Tale of the fallen Onmyoji
  • Umbral Omen

Xbox Series X

  • 02-07

  • Hogwarts Legacy
  • Prison Tycoon: Under New Management
  • 02-10

  • Go! Go! PogoGirl
  • Touchdown Pinball

Xbox One

  • 02-07

  • Prison Tycoon: Under New Management
  • 02-09

  • Repentant
  • 02-10

  • Bumblebee - Little Bee Adventure
  • Go! Go! PogoGirl
  • Touchdown Pinball

PlayStation 5

  • 02-06

  • Dicey Dungeons
  • 02-07

  • Hogwarts Legacy
  • Prison Tycoon: Under New Management
  • 02-10

  • Go! Go! PogoGirl

PlayStation 4

  • 02-07

  • Prison Tycoon: Under New Management
  • 02-10

  • Go! Go! PogoGirl

Switch

  • 02-07

  • Nadir: A Grimdark Deck Builder
  • 02-08

  • Daily Dadish
  • 02-09

  • Bumblebee - Little Bee Adventure
  • Monster Outbreak
  • Perseverance: Complete Edition
  • Prison Tycoon: Under New Management
  • Rob Riches
  • Shuttlecock-H
  • 02-10

  • Go! Go! PogoGirl
  • Legion of Doom
  • Ragdoll Rage: Heroes Arena
  • Youmandriver

Comments