Nintendo announced a lot of new games coming to Nintendo Switch in the coming year, with this particular presentation focusing on indie games. I love indie games for a variety of reasons, whether it be because they tend to have more of a retro aesthetic or because there's a bit more room for innovation when the working with a smaller budget. This presentation is not only interesting to me because I want more indie games on Switch, but because I just want to hear about upcoming indie games in general that I might even purchased on PlayStation 4 instead. What can I say? I like trophies.
The first announcement in the presentation was Cuphead, the until-now Microsoft exclusive side-scrolling shooter with a 1930s cartoon aesthetic. I've never played the game, but I've heard about how fiendishly difficult and clever it is. All I can say is that it looks wonderful in motion and I'm more than happy to support games with detailed 2D artwork and animation. This was one of the few reasons I would ever consider buying an Xbox One, so if Cuphead is a sign that games like Ori and the Blind Forest is also coming to Switch, I'm very much on board.
I'm less interested in Overland, which is a post-apocalyptic tactical survival game. I tend not to dig survival games very much, even if the turn-based strategy elements of it do seem appealing to me. My Friend Pedro is a super wacky 2D action game with bullet-time physics. It seems fun, but definitely not a mandatory purchase either. One of the games that really intrigued me was Neo Cab, a narrative-driven game in which you assume the role of a rideshare driver in a futuristic society. Evidently your character is the last human driver in the city for reasons that are sort of unclear. I really love the art style and character designs, and the concept is really intriguing. I can't help but be reminded of a game like VA11HALLA, which has a similar cyberpunk/simulation theme, but with bartending. I need to play that game too.
I'm not hearing as many folks talk about Red Lantern, which strikes me as a really intriguing idea for a game. It's a first-person narrative adventure game in which you take the role of a woman who picks up her life and travels to Alaska to compete in the Iditarod. Things don't go as planned and she ends up having to fight for her survival in the forbidding frozen wilderness. I'll probably wait for reviews before pulling the trigger on this one but I am pretty intrigued by it. I definitely get Firewatch vibes from it.
Darkwood is a top-down survival horror game which I have precisely zero interest in--but what does look really cool is Katana Zero, a stylish action game in which enemies can be dispatched with a single hit. Of course, your character can die in one hit, too. According to the trailer, it's pretty easy to rewind to the beginning of the level when you die, allowing you to gradually learn the best path through the level. It looks really nice. Ideally, it would be satisfying and challenging in the same way Celeste is, but that remains to be seen.
Yet another appealing game was Rad, a game which has a title I'm just wild about. I say "rad" all the time. Just ask anyone. This is a 3D brawler from the fine folks at Double Fine. This game is drenched in an 80s aesthetic, with radical tunes to match. It's post-apocalyptic, but doesn't seem to take itself seriously at all, which is really fun. It looks like mutating various body parts is important to the gameplay, which sounds pretty... rad.
Creature in the Well has a fantastic name but the actual game looks pretty bizarre. It's a mashup between hack-and-slash and pinball. It looks really hectic and maybe pretty stressful to play. I think I'll give this one pass. I feel similarly about Bloodroots, which does seem to have interesting interactions with the environment in its action combat, but nothing else about it seems particularly engaging from a casual glance. And then there's Pine, which looks shocking similar to Breath of the Wild except with more of an emphasis on trading and survival, which definitely isn't my cup of tea.
I'm somewhat interested in Blaster Master Zero 2 even though I haven't played the first one yet because Inti Creates is a solid developer I have a soft spot for primarily due to Mega Man Zero and Azure Striker Gunvolt. It's not a huge priority for me, though.
What everyone is talking about is of course Cadence of Hyrule, which is simultaneously a sequel to Crypt of the Necrodancer and a new Zelda game! It's really unprecedented to hand over the reins of the Zelda IP to an independent developer but I'm pretty excited that it's happening. I loved Crypt of the Necrodancer and probably unlike just about everyone else in the world, I'm mostly excited just to be getting a sequel to that. But I'm totally on board for 25 remixed Zelda tunes and being able to tackle baddies in rhythmic combat with Link and Zelda themselves.
All in all, it was a super strong Direct and I'm personally interested in getting several of the games. As of right now, I know I'll definitely be getting:
Cuphead
Neo Cab
Katana Zero
Rad
Cadence of Hyrule
And I would consider others if the reviews are good. I definitely have my eye on Red Lantern for sure, and I would pick up Blaster Master Zero 2 if I ended up enjoying the first game.
No comments:
Post a Comment