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New Game Releases 04/23/24 – 04/29/24

Andy Tuttle

The lack of games the last three weeks has finally ended and we’ve got a serious overload of titles to choose from. There’s a bunch of stuff to see below, so no more words, I’ll just let the trailers speak for themselves, after a quick video from yours truly…

Top Releases:

Eiyuden Chronicle: Hundred Heroes (PC/PS4/PS5/Switch/Xbox One/Series X|S) – Releases Apr. 23rd

Developed by: Rabbit and Bear Studios
Published by: 505 Games

Sand Land (PC/PS4/PS5/Series X|S) – Releases Apr. 26th

Developed by: ILCA
Published by: Bandai Namco Entertainment

Stellar Blade (PS5) – Releases Apr. 26th

Developed by: Shift Up
Published by: Sony Interactive Entertainment

Lunar Lander Beyond (PC/PS4/PS5/Switch/Xbox One/Series X|S) – Releases Apr. 23rd

Developed by: Dreams Uncorporated
Published by: Atari

Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles Arcade: Wrath of the Mutants (PC/PS4/PS5/Switch/Xbox One/Series X|S) – Releases Apr. 23rd

Developed by: Cradle Games
Published by: GameMill Entertainment

SaGa Emerald Beyond (Android/iOS/PC/PS4/PS5/Switch) – Releases Apr. 23rd

Developed by: Square Enix
Published by: Square Enix

TopSpin 2K25 (PC/PS4/PS5/Xbox One/Series X|S) – Releases Apr. 23rd

Developed by: Hanger 13
Published by: 2K

Demon Slayer – Kimestsu no Yaiba – Sweep the Board! (Switch) – Releases Apr. 26th

Developed by: CyberConnect2/Aniplex
Published by: Sega

Ports and Re-releases:

Fallout 4 (PS5/Series X|S) – Releases Apr. 25th
WRATH: Aeon of Ruin (PS4/PS5/Switch/Xbox One) – Releases Apr. 16th

Have you all been watching the new Fallout show on Amazon Prime? It’s pretty good, great even! If you’ve already binged the entire first season then why not continue your time in the wasteland and see Fallout 4 in majestic Ultra HD.

Oh, and that 3d Reams shooter, WRATH: Aeon of Ruin is coming to consoles. You remember that game, right?

Expansions:

Remnant 2 – The Forgotten Kingdom (PC/PS5/Series X|S) – Releases Apr. 23rd

If you need some soulslike SLC to play before Elden Ring’s DLC, why not check out what Remnant II has to offer.

Everything else:

If you don’t have room for Dadish 3D in your heart then what kind of monster are you?

Hey, there are so, SO MANY PC games coming out this week, which is nuts. Typically I skip past a lot of these because they almost always look like shovelware. However, this week’s offerings all appear to fall into that indie sweet spot and, I imagine, we’ll see a good number of these get ported to consoles in the next few months, so better to bring them up now.

Notable Releases from 10, 20, and 30 years ago:

The overwhelming heat at Knott’s Berry Farm has left me a bit loopy, so let’s plow through these.

2014 saw the release of the fighting game JoJo’s Bizarre Adventure: All Star Battle, which, at the time, was the fifth JoJo game to come out, but only the second to make it West. The game was developed by CyberConnect2, best known as the team behind the .hack series, as well as the Naruto: Ultimate Ninja franchise.

The game contains 32 characters in the base game, from Parts 1-8 of the JoJo series, with an additional nine characters added as DLC, including Ikuro Hashizawa, the protagonist from Baoh, another manga from JoJo creator Hirohiko Araki. All Star Battle was a huge hit in Japan both critically and commercially, receiving a perfect 40/40 score in Famitsu, and selling over 500k copies at launch.

Prior to its North American release, critics were a little less charitable, calling the game unbalanced and full of predatory micro-transactions. In response, CyberConnect2 fixed the balance problems, lowered an energy recharge gauge from 20 minutes to 5 minutes, and changed several paid items to free. A remastered version of the game, All Star Battle R, was released on modern consoles in 2022, which included new stages, new characters, new gameplay mechanics, and revamped the single player mode. This remaster is the easiest (and cheapest) version to play today, as the PS3 original can sometimes fetch a high price on secondary markets.

Moving to 2004, we’ve got the action-adventure game Onimusha 3: Demon Siege. After a disastrous reception to Onimusha 2 in North America and Europe, Capcom was determined to make Onimusha 3 a more appealing game to Western audiences. The team decided to set the game in a modern day city and initially opted for New York City. However, finding that too many stories had already been set there, the team shifted focus to Paris, France. This change was also seen as having a double effect as well, since Onimusha 2 performed the worst in Europe.

In the game, players take on the role of the first game’s protagonist, Samanosuke Akechi, as he travels through time and ends up in modern day Paris. However, Akechi is not the only time traveler, a French officer named Jacques Blanc (played by actor Jean Reno) has swapped places with him, ending up in Feudal Japan. Players swap between the two protagonists as the story dictates, attempting to defeat Nobunaga’s invading Genma army.

Critics were very impressed with Onimusha 3, receiving high scores from just about every outlet. In Japan, the game was a massive commercial success, being once of the best selling games of the year. However, Capcom’s plans to increase sales in the West did not pan out, with the game being a huge financial disappointment. While Capcom assumed Western audiences would applaud the time period change and use of a well known European actor, it had the opposite effect, with a lot of critics questioning why the series went in such a bizarre direction, and calling Reno’s inclusion distracting.

This would be the final entry in the series, sadly, but it would inspire Shinji Mikami when making Resident Evil 4. He had felt that Onimusha 3 might have been better received if they used a third person, over the shoulder camera angle, so he tried it out in RE4 and, well, the rest is history. Onimusha 3 is unavailable on modern consoles, with emulation or a copy of the original disc being your only means of playing it.

Our notable title from 1994 is the SNES game Claymates, a platformer from Visual Concepts, the creators of Clay Fighter. Like that game, Claymates used stop motion animation for its characters, “claymation”, digitizing these models for use in the game. Visual Concepts had high hopes for the game, wanting something that had the speed of Sonic games, the level design of Mario games, and colors that had never been seen on the SNES before.

While I can find information about the critical reception (they loved it), I can’t find anything about how well it sold. I can only assume it didn’t sell very well because, I mean, there’s no sequel, and it’s not like we’re all sitting around talking about the good old days playing Claymates. The game did, though, receive a re-release on the Switch through Nintendo’s online program, so go on, play it, give it the attention it deserves.

Stepping away from games, let’s talk about movies! 2014 gave us the revenge thriller Blue Ruin, the story of a man named Dwight who murders the man that killed his parents twenty years earlier. However, instead of going to the police, the dead man’s family comes after Dwight who must learn to defend himself from an old high school buddy (played by Buzz from Home Alone). I hope I’m not making it sound goofy, because it is not. Blue Ruin is an intense thriller that had me on the edge of my seat the entire time; check it out.

2004 gave us the movie 13 Going on 30, the story of a 13-year-old girl named Jenna from the 1980’s waking up in the year 2004 as a 30-year-old. She wanted to be a hot shot magazine editor with cool friends and, well, she gets it, but in the process becomes a total ass hole. Hijinks ensue, there’s lots of jokes about how modern things are CRAZY and, of course, there’s a choreographed dance to Michael Jackson’s “Thriller”. This movie sucks, but it’s cute.

1994’s notable film is the college comedy PCU from writer Zak Penn who you might know for his work on several comic book & “genre” films like X-Men, Elektra, and Ready Player One. The movie is about a group of college students in the “bad frat” or whatever (think the Delta frat from Animal House), that get under the skin of not just a crusty old Dean, but also all of the no-fun, PC, college students who would rather save the whales than smoke a joint. It’s 30 years later and we’re still having this same, boring conversation about how the PC crowd needs to lighten up and cut loose. While the movie isn’t very funny, I have fond memories of watching it on Comedy Central in the late 90’s, particularly because of David Spade. I also thought Jeremy Piven was cool for, like, two seconds, and then figured out he was kind of a douche.

Oh boy, what’s next, music? Um, 2014, Indie Cindy by Pixies. Good stuff, sounds like their old shit, I dig it. 2004, Satanic Panic in the Attic, another weird entry from the band Of Montreal. A film school buddy of mine was really into this band and so I got really into the band. 1994, ooohh, Weight by Rollins Band. This album is not on Spotify for some reason, which is too bad because the song “Liar” is a fucking classic with an all time great music video. I mean, you can buy it digitally, but we all like free shit, don’t we?

JoJo’s Bizarre Adventure: All Star Battle (PS3) – Released Apr. 29th, 2014: Wiki Link

Notable Film Release: Blue Ruin – Starring Macon Blair, Amy Hargreaves, and Devin Ratray
*Click here to watch the trailer*
Notable Album Release: Pixies – Indie Cindy
*Click here to listen to the album*

Onimusha 3: Demon Siege (PS2) – Released Apr. 27th, 2004: Wiki Link

Notable Film Release: 13 Going on 30 – Starring Jennifer Garner, Mark Ruffalo, Judy Greer, and Andy Serkis
*Click here to watch the trailer*
Notable Album Release: Of Montreal – Satanic Panic in the Attic
*Click here to listen to the album*

Claymates (SNES) – Released Apr. 26th, 1994: Wiki Link

Notable Film Release: PCU – Starring Jeremy Piven, Chris Young, Alex Désert, Jon Favreau, Megan Ward, Sarah Trigger, David Spade, Jessica Walter, and George Clinton & Parliament-Funkadelic
*Click here to watch the trailer*
Notable Album Release: Rollins Band – Weight
*Click here to listen to the album*

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