Overwatch

You know what was also one of the most fun online games I’ve played in years featuring a color array of characters and objectives? Overwatch. Some people say “I’m not too sure about this. Blizzard is good at RTS games and MMOs. They have no experience in FPS. This sounds sketchy.” But this is a classic example of a wildly popular video game company picking something new and knocking it out of the damn park.

I remember how refreshing, new, and interesting TF2 felt when it was first released. That feeling is back in a big way with Overwatch. The map I got to play was a combination of capture-the-point and push-the-cart types, both pretty standard. The real standout features of this game, though, are the characters. From people who can rewind time to areas that can only be accessed by certain types of characters, Blizzard seems to have put a lot of thought in to how to breathe new life in to the classic FPS VS gameplay style.

It’s only fair to compare it to TF2. Cartoony graphics, familiar map types, different classes, unique humor. Hell, the heavy in both games has the same accent. Granted, Overwatch’s heavy is a badass Russian woman with a ping mohawk and a sweet scar and TF2’s heavy is a sandwich-wielding brute whose has Dr. Robotnik legs, but they’re both pretty similar. It feels as if Overwatch is what TF3 would be if there was one. Minus hats (so far).

This is really a game to look forward to. Put it on your watch list, set aside money, buy a high powered mouse, and get ready to obsess over another FPS because Blizzard is doing what they do best — suck up your time.

Platform: PC, Mac

Release Date: 2016

Dragon Fin Soup

Full disclosure, I backed this game on Kickstarter. And I mean how could you not? The dev team wanted to bring the Grimm Brothers stories to life as gritty as they were meant to be. You play as Red, an alcoholic mercenary in search of the man who killed her parents. Accompanied by her wolf Big Bad, you’ll do quests for money and gather information on your parents’ murderer on your quest for vengeance.

The game play is very interesting, something I haven’t seen in a long time. It’s like a combo of a strategy game and an action game. Each action you take from moving forward to swinging your sword is one turn and when you take a turn, your enemies also take a turn at the same time. Sometimes, this doesn’t matter. Like when you’re a village, you just move around at will and do stuff with reckless abandon. When you’re out in the field though, you really take time and care with each move you make. It turns in to a strategy game whose pace is entirely up to you very quickly. It’s a bit like Crypt of the Necrodancer without the catchy music, but with really interesting characters.

The game is also procedurally generated, so depending on the seed, you get different layouts to the whole game. It’s highly likely that the starting village of my playthrough would look nothing like the starting village of a second playthrough. As a result, there’s a few interesting modes to try out when you don’t want to play the story. You can try your best at a rogue-like dungeon crawler to grab loot and level up, or you can choose an infinite dungeon and keep going until you can’t go no mo’.

The game is nearing completion, with finishing touches coming and just a few more bugs to work out. Look out for this game coming your way

Platform: Playstation 3, Playstation Vita, Playstation 4, PC, Mac, Linux

Release Date: Spring 2015

Necropolis

Rogue-likes have been multiplying for the past few years and this year is no exception. Necropolis is a 3D third person action puzzler Rogue-like and if that’s not enough identifiers, I don’t know what is. You play as an adventurer plundering Armistead the Mage’s castle in search of loot. As you acquire more loot, you’ll also find more weapons, better upgrades, etc. You know, the Rogue-like formula.

The art style has very simple textures against mute colors and dark backgrounds, producing a really cool environment to explore. The monsters you encounter can also be encouraged to hit each other by out maneuvering their attacks, making one attack another which makes the victim mad and he counter attacks, so the aggressor attacks back and this goes on until they realize “wait a second, weren’t we killing that guy?”.

Each area of the castle is generated differently each time, adding almost infinite replayability to the game. For those who can’t stop their dungeon-crawlin’ fever, Necropolis is a title you’ll want to keep an eye out for.

Platform: Steam, Consoles (undetermined)

Release Date: TBD