Something for the Weekend – 24/07/21

I think there’s few things that brits like more than the end of a summer heat wave. Sure, we won’t be able to complain about how it’s too hot, too sunny, too “close” it is anymore, but it should come with a blessed reprieve from all the things that we’ve been griping about for the last week. Of course, considering the weather extremes we’re seeing around the world, let’s hope the promised thunderstorms aren’t too dramatic.

Turning our gaze toward video games and EA might have hoped to have the headlines to themselves after EA Play Live, but instead one of the biggest stories of the week instead revealed more of the awful toxicity, discrimination and harassment that is allowed to persist in parts of the games industry.

In the News This Week

Games in Review

We had just a handful of reviews coming in this week, but let me tell you that we have an absolute classic amongst them. If you like JRPGs, make sure to check out Cris Tales.

• Cris Tales – PS5, XSX|S, PS4, XBO, NSW, PC – 9/10
• Ragnaröck – Oculus Quest, SteamVR – 9/10

Beside that, there was one headset and one… movie? Yes, a film to review!

Featured Articles

We had plenty of previews and other features to pick up the slack. I played the long in development Psychonauts 2, getting to sample a good few hours from the start of the game and coming away rather pleased by what I saw.

Alexis previewed the very strange looking Happy’s Humble Burger Farm, while Steve checked out the devilish Rogue Lords and Nic R sampled the procedural galactic life simulator The Fermi Paradox.From EA Play Live, I took a look at how Battlefield Portal blends old and new for Battlefield 2042’s grand community mash-up experience.

Nic spent last weekend wandering the streets of London, and while not perfect, concluded that Pokémon Go Fest 2021 was the 5th anniversary celebration the game deserved, and Amelia joined us to ponder how Disney is looking to take on video games once more, and the Lucasfilm Games announcements earlier this year were just the start.

Lastly, What We Played featured Cris Tales, Ragnarok and Psychonauts 2

Trailer Park

Lost Judgment’s new footage gives us look at Yagami’s detective toolkit

Dead Space remake is coming to PS5, Xbox Series X|S & PC

See the Battlefield Portal announcement trailer

I Expect You To Die 2 hatches a dastardly new plan on 24th August

Your Achievements

Here’s what you in our community has been up to this week:

• ron_mcphatty picked up a second hand graphics card that can happily play anything he throws at it. So he’s quickly checked out Cyberpunk 2077 before playing the Star Wars Battlefront 2 story through, and downloaded Destiny 2 to try while hiding from thunderstorms.
• TSBonyman is still getting used to some of the quirks of the PlayStation 5, but has mainly spent his week going back to play PS Plus games like Binding of Isaac, Dead Nation, Resogun and CounterSpy. Oh, and the playtime stats reveal that he’s played well over 1000 hours in both No Man’s Sky and Dreams!
• willbuchanan finished off the main story in Borderlands 3 and ranked up to level 50. Now there’s just side missions between him and the platinum before he can shift his sights to the DLC.
• MrYd has sensibly been avoiding VR gaming, which meant playing through the Resident Evil 2 and 3 remakes, playing plenty of the “still very silly” One Piece Pirate Warriors 4, and a bit of Thronebreaker. There was also plenty of the Splitgate beta, while the servers were working. Oh, and Planet Coaster and Operenecia: The Stolen Sun from the PS Store Summer Sale.
• And finally Jag has played a lot of F1 2021, enjoying the two player career mode with his brother, tried out the survival mode in Streets of Rage 4, and little bits of Wreckfest, Doom Eternal, Dirt 5, Shadow of the Tomb Raider and Sniper Elite 4, after their various upgrades.

That’s it for this week’s gaming round-up. As always, have fun at home, stay safe if and when you’re out, and we’ll see you next week.