The collection comes from a mysterious (and fictional) 80s video game company and includes puzzles and platformers, RPGs and category-defying hybrids, all in 8-bit splendour When it comes to video games, one thing is universal: releasing one is tough. But releasing 50? At once? That’s another boss level entirely. This is the challenge for the team behind UFO 50. This much anticipated 8-bit anthology of retro-styled games is finally due to release this September, seven years after its announcement. With 50 games included, the wait is justified. UFO 50 is a jumbo variety pack of complete video games, each with its own title, genre and story. “They’re not minigames,” asserts developer Derek Yu and creator of 2008 platformer Spelunky, named one of the greatest games ever made. “Every game could exist as a full release on some 80s console or computer.” Continue reading...

PC; Blizzard On the verge of World of Warcraft’s 20th anniversary, Blizzard appears to have pulled off a tentative return to form for this historic game World of Warcraft has an enduring identity problem. What was once one of the biggest games in the world is now approaching its 20th birthday, and with every year that goes by, developer Blizzard has the unenviable challenge of trying to prove that WoW still has a place in today’s gaming world. This goes some way to explaining the many times that Blizzard has tried to reinvent WoW. Six years after its initial release, the developer attempted a radical do-over of the game’s world in 2010’s Cataclysm expansion, in which an ancient dragon ravaged and reshaped the realm of Azeroth (an experience you can relive through the recently relaunched Cataclysm Classic). Since then, Blizzard has experimented with numerous gimmicks to try to keep WoW current, including a now much-maligned mechanic that saw players building their power level for two years, only to lose that power at the end of every expansion cycle. Continue reading...

It is beautifully made but achingly familiar so could struggle to lure players away from what is already out there It is fair to say that the video game industry is undergoing a period of alarming disarray. Studios are closing, development budgets are exploding and profitable genres are becoming saturated by mega-budget pick-me candidates that feel utterly interchangeable. Into this troubling market comes Concord, Sony’s new five-v-five “hero” shooter, the subgenre of the multiplayer online blaster where players control characters with elaborate special powers rather than identikit spec-ops soldiers or space marines. Set in a warring galaxy controlled by an autocratic regime known as The Guild, the game gives us control of various Freegunners – mercenaries who plough the space lanes looking for jobs while also slinging one-liners at each other in the game’s highly polished cutscenes. In the game, however, what they do is fight. Continue reading...

Firaxis Games needed to move on from Civilization 6 because, its developers explain, ‘it was getting too big for its britches’ It’s been eight years since Civilization 6 – the most recent in a very long-running strategy game series that sees you take a nation from the prehistoric settlement of their first town through centuries of development until they reach the space age. Since 2016 it has amassed an abundance of expansions, scenario packs, new nations, modes and systems for players to master – but series producer Dennis Shirk at Firaxis Games feels that enough it enough. “It was getting too big for its britches,” he says. “It was time to make something new.” “It’s tough to even get through the whole game,” designer Ed Beach says, singling out the key problem that Firaxis aims to solve with the forthcoming Civilization 7. While the early turns of a campaign in Civilization 6 can be swift, when you’re only deciding the actions for the population of a single town, “the number of systems, units, and entities you must manage explodes after a while,” Beach says. From turn one to victory, a single campaign can take more than 20 hours, and if you start falling behind other nations, it can be tempting to restart long before you see the endgame. Civilization 7 will be released on PC, Mac, Xbox, PlayStation 4/5 and Nintendo Switch on 11 February 2025. Continue reading...

PC; Suspicious Developments Guide a mismatched team including a Navy Seer and a necro-medic through this smart, funny, and resolutely empathetic espionage thriller As a game that relies heavily on glimpsing the future, the best place to start with Tactical Breach Wizards is slightly ahead of ourselves. So let’s kick off with the fact that this magical mystery spec-ops tour is the most significant turn-based tactics game since the venerable XCOM 2. Its blend of ingeniously flexible puzzles and deliriously funny writing would be sufficient to clear it for active duty on anyone’s gaming device. But what qualifies it for the Special Arcane Service is how boldly it stares down the murky morality of military-themed games. Placing you in command of a ragtag team of witch detectives, necro-medics, time-manipulating wizards, and a druid hitman, Tactical Breach Wizards challenges you with using your squad’s eclectic powers to overcome escalating tactical siege scenarios. A typical level will require you to breach and enter a room, disable a half-dozen enemies, barricade doors to keep out reinforcements, and reach the computer that unlocks the pathway to the next room. Tactical Breach Wizards is out 22 August Continue reading...

The creators of the Lego Star Wars and Lego Harry Potter games bring similar energy and humour to this gentle action-adventure Ever since they first clambered into shops in 2010, Funko Pop figures have been an unavoidable part of pop culture fandom, lending their black-eyed large-headed charm to everything from Ms Marvel to Mr Bean. After a couple of minor smartphone releases it was inevitable they’d eventually make it into a major video game. But what could have been a lazy cash-in looks to be a lot more promising. Funko Fusion is the first title from Warrington-based studio 10:10, formed by Jon Burton and Arthur Parsons, the directors on most of the vastly successful Lego titles such as Lego Star Wars and Lego Harry Potter. Their aim is to bring the same energy and humour to the Funko universe. Funko Fusion, then, is a classic cartoon-style action adventure, beholden to the Lego titles naturally, but also to PlayStation favourites Ratchet & Clank and Jak and Daxter. Players get to explore seven themed worlds based around Funko Pop figures and key licensor NBC Universal. As Parsons recalls: “I remember we got sent a spreadsheet, which listed everything that NBC Universal owns from back in the 1920s all the way to current day. And it was like, ‘wow, where do we start?’ That was the fun bit.” Continue reading...

PC, PS5, PS4, Xbox Series XS, Xbox One; Red Thread Games; Spotlight by Quantic Dream Dustborn tries to be more than just another narrative travel game, but its half-baked focus on serious topics weighs down great dialogue and beautiful character writing The story begins on the road, miles out from a state border in an alternative US. The stakes are clear, even when nothing else is: Pax, the player character, is a Black woman in her 30s, who has just completed a heist with her friends. The border means freedom. The police car telling you to pull over means trouble. Pax and co are Anomals, people who wield manipulative vocal abilities called vox. Pax can bend people to her will by making them feel bad, using abilities named “trigger” or “cancel”. Her ex-partner, Noam, can soothe people with an ability known as “gaslighting”. Dustborn certainly isn’t subtle in what it’s trying to say. Soon you encounter people who get infected by weaponised disinformation. Continue reading...

Running a tea shop in the woods doesn’t help arena fighter Alta to escape her trauma. Designer Davey Wreden explains how his cosy gaming dream-fulfilment fantasy turned into something much more meta At first, Wanderstop appears to tap into the same restless urge as many other cosy games: the wish to leave our stressful lives behind and escape to an anonymous wilderness. The game opens with you taking an assistant job in a woodland tea shop, where you spend your days cleaning, tending the garden, and researching the perfect tea blend to satisfy the needs of visiting customers. Scratch a little deeper, though, and you find a game tearing at the hollow rewards of the escapist fantasy. The bucolic setting is born out of an image game designer Davey Wreden became fixated on in the months after the release of 2015’s The Beginner’s Guide. His mind would repeatedly wander to a daydream of going to a tea shop in the woods and lying on a bench by the water. He sketched variations of the scene for months before deciding to make it as his next game. Continue reading...

From the writer of lockdown hit Before Your Eyes, the new game uses VR or plain old webcam tech to see how life looks as a paranormally gifted infant How do you follow the game that made the world cry? It’s a question that’s haunted writer Graham Parkes ever since 2021’s Bafta-winning Before Your Eyes. Released during the height of lockdown, Parkes’ webcam-controlled yarn uses players’ blinks to fast-forward through protagonist Benny’s memories, blinking in and out of each uplifting and gut-wrenching moment of his existence. It quickly gained a reputation for being a Twitch tearjerker, its affecting tale and months of pandemic-fuelled misery creating a perfect, Kleenex-blowing storm. “As a writer, that has definitely been intimidating.,” says Parkes, “I’m interested in using games to tell concise, emotional stories, but we can’t say that every single time we’re going to make you weep.” Still, tears or no, things are already looking pretty promising for Before Your Eyes’ intriguing followup, Goodnight Universe. Developed by Nice Dream, an all-new studio formed by creators Graham Parkes and Oliver Lewin, Goodnight Universe has already won the 2024 game award at the Tribeca film festival, beating the brilliant Thank Goodness You’re Here! to the punch. Continue reading...

Devolver Digital; PC Playing the producer of a seemingly glitzy reality TV show, audiences and cast must be kept happy, no matter how outrageous the request, in easily the funniest game I’ve played all year The developers of The Crush House, Nerial, describe the game as as a “thirst person shooter,” and it’s a surprisingly accurate tagline. A grand vaporwave-and-neon mansion stands on the Malibu coastline, and you – Jae, the producer – sleep in the bleak little basement underneath it. Your job is to stalk around the house behind a camera, filming the glamorous, sexy participants in a reality show. You choose the cast every season, from a panel of 12, and you trail them around the lurid property, hoping they fight, or make out, or both, so that your ratings will go up and your viewers will be satisfied. You can move about freely, but are warned to absolutely never talk to the cast. The game certainly does, as the tagline suggests, take on the feel of a first-person shooter, but you wield a camera instead of a gun. Think Pokémon Snap, but sexy. Every night, a different set of audiences tune in, and all of them have very specific needs – some want drama, some want to see the art that hangs in the house, some want to see food being prepared. And yes, some want to see feet, lots of feet – or other body parts, zoomed in on, and in detail. And your job is to please all of them, or risk cancellation. Continue reading...