October 9 - 15

  Felix “Binary World” Threepaper

Welcome folks, and happy “1,255th Anniversary of the coronation of Charlemagne” week!

On 9 October 768, Charlemagne was crowned King of the Franks. So was his younger brother, Carloman. Thus began an uneasy power-sharing arrangement. Rebellions would pop up around Aquitaine, and each brother would turn up with his army to put the rebellion down. Once the rebels dispersed, the armies would be left eyeing each other off. Their mother often had to intervene to stop their quarrels. Carloman died in 771, apparently of natural causes, and Charlemagne named his second son Carloman, so maybe they didn’t hate each other that much after all. You may all celebrate by playing a game where you have a best frenemy.

Forza Motorsport brings all the ray-tracing and photorealism you’d expect to the latest-gen Xbox. It also packs in a heap of “games as service”, monetised RPG progression features. There’s a plan to sell you further tracks and cars down the line. Also, the new Car Points system locks car upgrades to that specific car, so that you have to win races with a car to unlock Car Points to upgrade that car. It encourages becoming familiar with different cars and going deep on their specs, but steps away from previous games’ focus on unlocking a huge car collection relatively easily and then choosing which ones you want to play with.

Lords of the Fallen is a Soulsborne that doesn’t just play like a Souls game, but looks like one too, with its ‘cursed fantasy’ aesthetic, level design, and even the UI font. The feature that makes it stand apart is the Umbral layer: an undead realm which you can look into and visit at any time with a button press. It’s basically a whole other map superimposed onto the main map. The Umbral realm has a different layout from the main map, which affects exploration. For example, it may have a passageway where the main map has a wall, helping you to get to a new part of the main map. The Umbral realm is also more challenging. You earn more ‘souls’ down there but the longer you stay, the stronger the enemies become, until you are overwhelmed. The interaction between the two realms opens up a lot of interesting angles for exploration and your risk/reward calculations.

ROBLOX makes its way onto Playstation platforms. Please don’t tell my kids, or I’ll never get a turn on my PS5 again.

Long Gone Days is a 2D, indie RPG set in a near-future world of forever-war where you play as a sniper who has been raised by a private military company in an underground bunker. As you recruit a squad to uncover the main intrigue through dialogue and turn-based combat, language is a factor: squaddies and NPCs speak different languages and you’ll need interpreters to understand them. The first act is in Early Access, if you want a taste before the full game comes out.

By contrast, Lil Gator Game is a cheery, low-poly game about kids playing together. A little gator and his friends have decked out a whole island with cardboard craft items to play an epic quest game with big sis, but she’s got homework. So they decide that they will entice her to play by playing the game. Kid logic. Anyhoo, it ends up being like a preschool, arts-n-craft Zelda, complete with paraglider, stamina bar for climbing and shield-surfing, but no combat or health bars. It’s a wholesome time that averaged 84 on Metacritic when it came out on Switch last year.

Wild Card Football is arcade-style, 7-on-7 American football with no refs. It has a deckbuilding element in that you get Wild Cards, which unlock super moves during plays. You can grow a player big so they can Hulk out and stomp to the endzone, stop another player from passing, and other rule-breaking effects. It’s also got a roster of hundreds of licensed players, including Colin Kaepernick.

Desolatium is a point-n-click graphic adventure steeped heavily in Lovecraftian mythos.

The Batman: Arkham games are coming out on Switch, if you’ve somehow missed them up until now and want some handheld goon punching.

Lords of the Fallen looks best this week, if you can get past the grimdark, Souls-y art style. The combat looks sufficiently crunchy, with magic builds on offer too. Coming hot on the heels of Lies of P, it’s a good time for fans of the Souls formula.

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

PC

• 10-09

• Adrift Program
• Aftermath (Aftermath)
• Akayo Therapy
• Deep Maze
• Down There Somewhere
• EarthKart
• Easy VTT
• Escape the Dark Tower
• Hidden Space Top-Down 3D
• Install Fee Tycoon
• King of the Times
• Land of the Vikings
• Magical Lands
• Maginet
• Shiba Simulator Supreme
• The brave rush forward
• Where's My Loot?
• You are Wolf Card Death!

• 10-10

• Adventures of Steve the Cat
• Animalia
• Blob Life
• Carball 360
• Costly Adventure
• Counter Ops: Blackout Assault
• Forebloomed: Evergreen Edition
• Forza Motorsport
• Gearbits
• Geist
• Halloween Defense
• Harvest Island
• Hearts of Iron IV: Arms Against Tyranny
• Hua Mu: Preface
• Power Champions
• Push That Cat!!
• The Fall Of Elements
• Unavailed
• Wild Card Football

• 10-11

• Age
• Bioid
• Femboy Burgers
• Hidden World War II Top-Down 3D
• Lair of goblins
• Monolith
• Order from Caos 2
• RedRaptor
• RedRaptor
• Sonny The Mad Man: Casual Arcade Shooter
• Survival Quiz CITY Festival Edition
• Welcome, Get Out!

• 10-12

• Bingo Pets - Save the Pets
• Echoes of Numa
• Escape from Death
• GeminiFlame : Alpha Dragon
• Hero of Luxuria
• Hidden Breaking Bed Top-Down 3D
• I commissioned some cats 4
• Kittengumi: The Sakabato's Thief
• Nope Nope Nope Nope Nurses
• OVER Devil Legend of the sacred stone
• Polygon Arena
• River City: Rival Showdown
• Saltsea Chronicles
• SKULLFracture
• Star Trek: Infinite
• Subenishiki
• the Dwarf
• Totum
• VRekken
• Zombie Girl

Xbox Series X

• 10-10

• Forza Motorsport
• Lil Gator Game
• Long Gone Days
• Wild Card Football

• 10-11

• Between Time: Escape Room

• 10-12

• From Space
• Haunted House

• 10-13

• Alphadia I & II
• Desolatium
• Lords of the Fallen
• The Grinch: Christmas Adventures
• Transformers: Earthspark - Expedition

Xbox One

• 10-09

• Builder Simulator

• 10-10

• Lil Gator Game
• Wild Card Football

• 10-11

• Between Time: Escape Room

• 10-12

• From Space
• Haunted House

• 10-13

• Alphadia I & II
• Desolatium
• The Grinch: Christmas Adventures
• Transformers: Earthspark - Expedition

PlayStation 5

• 10-10

• BLINNK and the Vacuum of Space
• Lil Gator Game
• Long Gone Days
• Wild Card Football

• 10-11

• Honkai: Star Rail

• 10-12

• Haunted House
• Saltsea Chronicles

• 10-13

• Alphadia I & II
• Desolatium
• Lords of the Fallen
• The Grinch: Christmas Adventures

PlayStation 4

• 10-09

• Builder Simulator

• 10-10

• Lil Gator Game
• ROBLOX
• Wild Card Football

• 10-12

• Haunted House
• River City: Rival Showdown

• 10-13

• Alphadia I & II
• Desolatium
• The Grinch: Christmas Adventures
• Transformers: Earthspark - Expedition
• Vampire: The Masquerade - The New York Bundle

Nintendo Switch

• 10-10

• Airship Defender
• Long Gone Days
• Wild Card Football

• 10-11

• RedRaptor
• Supreme Car Parking Simulator 2024
• Terra Alia: The Language Discovery RPG

• 10-12

• Ancient Relics - Egypt
• Astebros
• Big Vehicle Simulator Games Bundle - Truck Farming Flight Construction Bus Ship
• Break the Glass Cup: Breaking Physics Puzzle
• Company of Heroes Collection
• Cook, Serve, Delicious!
• Dino Ranch - Ride to the Rescue
• Dwerve
• Dwerve
• Eventide 3: Legacy of Legends
• Haunted House
• Ironsmith Medieval Simulator
• Pinball FX: South Park Pinball
• Re.Surs
• Rear Sekai
• Rear Sekai
• River City: Rival Showdown
• Saltsea Chronicles
• subpar pool
• TRAPPED in The Tricky Prison

• 10-13

• Alphadia I & II
• Batman: Arkham Asylum
• Batman: Arkham City
• Batman: Arkham Knight
• Chemically Bonded
• Desolatium
• Sakura Alien
• Submersible Simulator - Discover the Titanic into Ocean
• The Grinch: Christmas Adventures
• Transformers: Earthspark - Expedition
• Traumatarium
• Vampire: The Masquerade - The New York Bundle
• Zombie Defense
• Zombie Raft

• 10-14

• Taxi Driver Simulator 2024