Jaggy's Corner - Summer Games Fest 2021 Wrap-Up

Summer Games Fest began in 2020 as the brainchild of Geoff Keighley. The free digital event is allowed to be co-streamed and it includes world premieres, dev interviews, and more! This year, viewers were able to see announcements and world premieres by a number of The Summer Games Fest partners including Annapurna Interactive, Capcom, Devolver Digital, Epic Games, Gearbox Publishing, Finji, Frontier, Koch Media, Bandai Namco, Netflix, Psyonix, Raw Fury, and Square Enix. However, there are multiple other partners that I didn’t list, but suffice it to say, the audience was able to experience some amazing announcements.

Estimated reading time: 7 minutes

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For the purposes of simplicity, I’ve categorized the games under Indie, Triple-A, and Unclassified. Sometimes a publisher is quite large but a developer is an indie. Other times, a studio might be rather small in size but have a huge reputation. Basically, what I’m saying is that readers may not agree with the overall category of these titles. My article here is just to talk about some of the announcements I’m excited about, so don’t fly off the deep end yeah?

Indie Games

In the indie category are some amazing titles that I’m super excited about for different reasons. The first one is Two Point Campus for me. See, I wanted Two Point Hospital without it being Two Point Hospital. I wanted the same style of game but a different backdrop or setting. As in, something that doesn’t revolve around the medical profession. Now, we finally have that and I want the game. True story.

Once again Raw Fury impresses me with their titles. The studio announced Sable, a beautifully illustrated open-world exploration game where players float, glide, and parkour their way around an alien planet. Players will learn the history of the inhabitants by checking out ancient ruins and monuments. What happened here and what will we learn? Frankly, I have no idea but I really want to know. The game will be available on Steam in late September and I am excited about it!

Another title that I almost missed by virtue of the fact that I wasn’t able to watch the entirety of Summer Games Fest because of the simultaneous E3 announcements is OXENFREE II: Lost Signals. Some of you may know that Epic Games often releases games for free each week. One of those titles was OXENFREE and originally I was hesitant on it. Thankfully, my amazing other half recommended I grab it and I’m so glad I did. While it’s a bit of a spooky title because of how the supernatural elements are presented, it is a worthwhile story that I thoroughly enjoyed. Originally, OXENFREE II: Lost Signals was announced during the Nintendo Indie World showcase back in April, but I saw it mentioned again. Needless to say, I’m quite happy and intrigued to find out more secrets about that place.

Some awesome announcements that I’m interested to see more about like the new Hide and Seek mode in Among Us that I’ve seen as mods for the game (It still confuses me sometimes), Solar Ash which has a graphics style similar to Risk of Rain and looks like an interesting action-adventure and platform game, Sky Children of Light – a neat open-world adventure game that will be released for the Nintendo Switch, and Planet of Lana which is a hand-painted cinematic puzzle adventure game where players follow a young girl and her pet friend. All of these titles look really interesting and spectacular so I may get my hands on some of them.

Other games announced that I qualified as indie are:

• Amplitude – Endless Dungeon
• Stray Bombay – The Anacrusis
• Torn Banner Studios – Chivalry II
• Dotemu – Metal Slug Tactics

Triple A Games

Some of the Triple-A games this year have some announcements I’m excited about starting with Jurassic World Evolution 2. Players get to continue designing a dinosaur zoo and splice the genes of different dinosaurs with others. As in, you can create new species of dinosaurs! Yeah. I’m all about zoo and park building games, so this is definitely on my list of titles to get!

Epic Games and Psyonix announced their partnership once again with the Fast & Furious franchise presumably because F9 is now officially in Theaters. This means that Rocket League has a DLC pack for the Dodge Charger and the Nissan Skyline that was released a couple of years back to promote the Fast & Furious series. However, because of the latest installment of the movie a new car has been added to the pack which is the Pontiac Fiero. Since I already own the first two cars, I won’t be rebuying the DLC for the Fiero, but people who missed out the first time around will be able to play with these smexy cars!

Two more games grabbed my attention during the Summer Games Fest and they are Tribes of Midgard – a Norse survival adventure RPG where players have to build up to defend against giants – and Ratchet & Clank Rift Apart which is a third-person shooter platformer and a sequel to Ratchet & Clank! Both these titles look amazing and I definitely want to give them a go.

Of course, it’s no secret that I’m a D&D fan as I have been playing for years and have kept up with a couple of shows like Critical Role on Twitch, so it stands to reason that the new action RPG D&D Dark Alliance is on my list of games to look at. It is a spiritual successor to Baldur’s Gate: Dark Alliance and I’m interested to take a stab at this game.

Another title that I’m curious about is Monster Hunter Stories 2: Wings of Ruin. While my introduction to the Monster Hunter series is World, I strangely enjoy the game. Besides, what’s not to love about Palico cat chefs! Yes. I am aware that Stories and World are completely different, but I am very interested to give this one a go. I may suck horribly at it, but why not? I’ve heard lots of good things from Monster Hunter fans.

Finally, there were a number of games that aren’t my style like Death Stranding Director’s Cut (although, what the heck were we supposed to glean from that trailer?), Tiny Tina’s Wonderlands, Salt & Sacrifice, Call of Duty Warzone Season 4, Far Cry 6, Tales of Arise, Dark Pictures Anthology – House of Ashes, and the show stopper Elden Ring. Now I know that many people are hyped about all of the aforementioned games but I don’t do CoD, Souls-like, or horror games. I’ve never had the opportunity to dry a Far Cry game and while I might enjoy it, I would probably struggle. These are just not really my style, so don’t fret.

Unclassified Studios and Titles

Sharkmob announced a new game called Bloodhunt which is a free-to-play battle royale title where players are vampires, and I’m excited. People who are interested in this sort of game can sign up for the closed beta on the website. Normally battle royales aren’t my thing, but this is vampires and it looks really awesome. I shall come for your blood!

Amazon Games finally showcased New World and Lostark that are both RPG games. I knew about New World coming out quite a long time ago. However, Lostark was not on my radar. It is a Korean-based MMORPG that is coming to North America. I’m a little hesitant on that one because the last Korean MMO did not leave a good taste in my mouth due to reasons… Anyways, maybe it’ll do well because it looks really awesome, but I’m not holding my breath.

At Summer Games Fest 2021 a new developer called Deviation Games announced their presence as did new publisher Finji. Neither studio has a lot of information to report, but I’m glad that we have the potential for new and exciting games in the future.

Koch Media announced a new publishing label Prime Matter that will be home to well-known franchises like Gun Grave G.O.R.E, Kingdom Come Deliverance, and Mount and Blade. The label will also have Dolmen, Encased, and Scars Above, just to name a few. More details can be found on their website or you can see the showcase here.

Summer Games Fest Thoughts

Between the two showcases of E3’s yearly event versus Summer Games Fest, I felt more enamored by the games presented in this list. While it’s not as extensive of a lineup, my interest is much higher for a lot of these games. I was even more hyped up about Elden Ring because I knew that people would be excited about the title, and I don’t care about souls games! On top of that, we did get to see some new shows and a movie featured at the event, and I’m all about movies. Besides, Ryan Reynolds is awesome. (You can check out that trailer here.)

Anyways, I can’t wait to get my hands on a bunch of these titles. How about you? What games are you hyped about this year?

 

Article by: Susan N.

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Bulletstorm: Full Clip Edition - PS4 Review

Have you ever wondered what it would be like to have a system judge your every action? If you have, now's your chance to live it! Bulletstorm is back for more foul-mouthed - and at times creative linguistic hilarity - with even more creative ways of taking out your enemies. The better you do? The more the systems rewards you by allowing for an easier time in dispatching the rest of the enemies headed your way.

Bulletstorm: Full Clip Edition is an enhanced version of Epic Games' different take on manly men with manlier guns. Bulletstorm took/takes some of the ideas from Gears of War and puts them into a first person shooter with ideas that make the Ratchet and Clank series so amazing. Crazy weapons that make you question "how" followed along with foul mouthed dialog (that have an ingame sensor), brutal and possibly horrifying gory graphics (which also have an ingame sensor) and Bulletstorm is essentially a good marriage of both Gears of War and Insomniac's masterpiece.

This really won't be for everyone even with the filters applied. For me however? I'm regretting not having played this on the previous generation because it's simply over the top and ridiculous. This "maybe should have started off sober" adventure soon turns… nah. It never turns "really" serious and the gameplay is creative keeping things interesting until the credits where most FPS would have gotten fairly stale halfway through. Without the complete over the top dialog and gameplay I don't think Bulletstorm could have pulled it off.

From start to finish Bulletstorm is a fast paced thrill ride with crazy guns, a energy leash and your boot. How often can you really say that your boot is not only a legitimate option in a shooter but also required and just as useful at the beginning as it is at the end? If you spend your whole time shooting all your enemies then you're doing it wrong which is why it was fun.

Each situation can be solved in a variety of ways from the obvious shooting your enemies over to using your leash to pull them closer, use it to pull them out of cover, use it to pull them towards and passed you off of a cliff or simply use your boot to do that instead. Spiked walls, a variety of cactus, electrified billboards, propane tanks and much more are all littered around each area just waiting to be leashed over so that you can kick it at your enemy. If that doesn't work you can simply kick the object or kick your enemy into the object.

However you decide to go about this, prepare to be judged. Defeating an enemy will yield a grand total of ten plus points in order to spend on ammo and upgrades. Kick them off a cliff? You're looking at fifty. Pull or kick them into spikes? That's about one-hundred. These are the easy ways but that'll only buy you a bit of ammo. Being more creative with throwing a gas tank and blowing it up in a crowd will gain you fifty points per person as well as a bonus for having tagged them all at the same time. Kicking a barrier into your enemies will do the same.

All of these points can be spent at what are really re-supply points in which ammo and upgrades can be unlocked. Upgrades unlock over time in order to be able to carry more ammo in a clip or give the weapon a charged attack. Charged shots require their own ammo counts but can be worth it especially when there's a large crowd and your shotgun has a incendiary blast. It'll clear up a good portion if not your entire set of attackers allowing you to move on quickly.

Bulletstorm is not meant to be taken slow. Everything is designed to move fast, shoot fast, kick fast and slide fast. Stay still and you're basically toast. Sometimes literally. This is why there are two aspects that could get in the way. The first is that hopping over barriers in order to move forward was sometimes a hassle as the prompt would not come up right away and trying to get over would instead send me sliding. Other times when going through a narrow space you could get caught on your AI partners going through as they don't need to worry about the space that you are taking up but you need to worry about theirs.

Finally the sniper fights were a hassle and felt slow and clunky with you being able to guide the bullet but the enemy could dodge it having you miss quite often by nothing more than a hair. They went under cover? You missed again because your bullet had no view. Your bullet was too far to the right or left because you wanted to make it around that cover? Forget about it as it once again went out of range and destroyed itself. Having to rely on a target lock was a pain and slowed things down significantly. Thankfully there are only three real sniper fights over the entire course and it can be easily made up with the fact that there was a remote controlled "mini-Godzilla" with a turret that you get to unleash on your enemies.

Bulletstorm: Full Clip Edition was a blast. It's ridiculous, fast paced, you have to wonder how much of the dialog was scripted and what was ad libbed and it just works. The variety of over the top weapons alongside the energy leash and being able to kick objects or enemies keeps things interesting. Anytime that the lull that can happen near the end starts to come in or starts to feel like it's getting close, there's a change up in the style to throw some spice back into the mix. I know that it's been almost six years since its original release but I hope that this gives enough push for a sequel.

Game Information

Platform:
Sony PlayStation 4
Developer(s):
People Can Fly
Epic Games
Publisher(s):
Gearbox Publishing
Genre(s):
First Person Shooter
Mode(s):
Single-player
Multiplayer
Other Platform(s):
Microsoft Xbox one
PC

Source:
Provided by Publisher

Article by Pierre-Yves

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Duke Nukem 3D: 20th Anniversary World Tour - PS4 Review

A Crisp and Reliable Royal-ass-kicking.

Like most gamers with a lifetime of virtual experiences, my current opinion of games played during my childhood and overconfident teenage years is often aggrandized by nostalgia. Playing these classic titles in the present day arouses sweet memories and emotions specific to the awe and wonder of my first play-through, so even if a game has aged like a rock star who’s spent his best crowd-surfing years cleansing and exfoliating his face with innumerable breasts caked in cocaine residue, I’d probably still enjoy and adore the title for the pleasure it gifted me with during those formative years.

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