One of the most joyous periods of the year for this job is when there aren’t five or more AAA blockbusters being released in rapid succession. It’s a time for quiet reflection for some, but for me it’s an opportunity to dive into my monstrous backlog. While I feel no pressure to create a checklist out of my backlog, there are always hidden gems waiting to be discovered. For this week’s Thanks for the Knowledge podcast, I sat down to discuss those hidden gems, the live service games, and the activities outside games that sustain us during this period with Senior Managing Editor Steven Strom and The Verge’s Ash Parrish.
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Through this conversation I learned more about ElecHead, a really delightful little puzzle platformer featuring a Mega Man-ass protagonist you can pick up now on Steam or later this summer on Nintendo Switch. Ash also talked about Escape Academy, an escape room simulator that gets the tactile nature of real escape rooms right, which is pretty cool! That comes out in a few weeks on June 28 on a bunch of different platforms including Xbox Game Pass.
Steven caught up with the latest (and strangest) No Man’s Sky expedition to date. Sounds thrilling if not a little frustrating, and it’ll probably get me to start my 17th save file for that game.
I felt just a little bad I put Ash on the spot about whether I should watch the Paramount+ Halo series. Her answer was perfect.
And of course, we talked about DRAINUS. How could we not? It’s the rad shmup with a name my coworkers are getting really tired of hearing me say in meetings, type in Slack, and tweet night and day. But for real! Get past the terrible name and check it out. I’m really bad at shmups but the blocking/absorption mechanic is really well-implemented and adds a wrinkle to the genre I really appreciate.
News items this week’s show discusses and a transcript of the roundtable are below:
News items discussed in this week’s episode:
- Raven Software’s QA team votes to unionize
- Certain Affinity relocating workers affected by restricted rights
- The Sims 4 adds oft-requested pronouns to game
- Metal Gear Rising Revengeance sees meme-fueled surge
- Morbius finds remarkable popularity on Twitch
- Neill Blomkamp may direct a Gran Turismo film
- Temtem leaving Early Access in September
- PAX not changing safety protocols in wake of enforcer death from Covid
- Capcom says there’s little hope of Darkstalkers resurrection
Transcript of the roundtable discussion (COMING SOON):
