The pickings are slimmer than the remains of a Boxing Day buffet this week, which is to be expected – the gaming industry always enters a lull between Christmas and NYE.
Even the Switch eShop is looking quiet, with only around five new releases due at the time of writing: the side-scrolling and puzzle packed Adventure Reborn, the NPC commanding Ultimate Battle Simulator, the pastel hued ice cream van sim Wander Scoop, and the pixel art action platformer MAUS.
Arcade Archives Space Invaders Part II comes to all formats meanwhile, with this being a follow-on from last week’s Space Invaders – a landmark title for the publisher’s 500th retro re-release.
On PSN there’s another management sim, in the form of Gym Business: Fitness Empire Simulator. That’s joined by the romantic visual novel Parallel Hearts, and Angry Cat – in which you get to trash an old lady’s home.
The Xbox then gains a bunch of releases from QubicGames, which appear to be a mixture of mobile conversions and older PC games. These include Real Boxing 2: Remastered, the chaotic looking top down battler Raptor Evolution, The Nom – which involves a creature escaping from a science lab – and (I kid you not) Foot Clinic. Slightly less dubious sounding is Tavern Manager Simulator, which appears to have been a steady seller on PC, entailing running a medieval tavern successfully from pouring frothy beers to tenderising meat.
Next week should be more exciting, with the likes of tinyBuild’s cozy survival game I Am Future, deck-building roguelike FAIRY TAIL: DUNGEONS, and Kemco’s newest RPG Hero Seekers due.