New Game Releases 07/01/25 – 07/07/25

It’s a holiday week, here in the U.S., so it looks like all of the video game companies took off to go eat burgers and hot dogs at their local BBQ while ICE Agents detain farm workers and line cooks for our “protection”. America…fuck yeah?

Our top game of the week is the latest entry in the Aery series, Titans of the Future, which is, I believe, the 24th release in the franchise. It must not be THAT big, though, because I can’t find a single video about it on YouTube. Instead, I decided to post the trailer for the Irem Collection Volume 3, which contains three horizontal shooters: 1987’s Mr. Heli (Battle Chopper), 1989’s Dragon Breed, and 1992’s Mystic Riders. Everything else is listed below with links to their Steam pages. Have a safe and fun 4th of July!

• The Echo Paradox (PC) – Releases Jul. 1^st
• Irem Collection Volume 3 (PS4/PS5/Switch/Xbox One/Series X|S) – Releases Jul. 1^st
• Neon Shift (PC) – Releases Jul. 1^st
• No Heroes Here 2 (PC/PS4/PS5/Switch/Xbox One/Series X|S) – Releases Jul. 1^st
• Upwards, Rain! The Post Office of Farewells (PC) – Releases Jul. 1^st
• Aery – Titans of the Future (Switch/Series X|S) – Releases Jul. 3^rd
• Milly’s Meadow (PC) – Releases Jul. 3^rd

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

Alright, I’m in lazy holiday week mode, will TRY to be as brief as possible here. Let’s find out what games, movies, and music we were listening to on 4th of July in the past 10, 20, and 30 years ago!

Games:

Kicking things off, from 2015, we’ve got the vehicular soccer game Rocket League which, I did not know, is actually a sequel to a 2008 PS3 game called Supersonic Acrobatic Rocket-Powered Battle-Cars (say that five times fast). Developer Psynoix had a really difficult time trying to sell publishers on SARPBC, who found the idea of mixing cars & soccer to be really confusing, having a hard time figuring out they would market and sell such an idea. This would force Psyonix to publish the game on their own and, while it had zero marketing and was ignored by critics, it found an audience on the PS3, with the game being downloaded over 2 million times. Psyonix knew they had something special and prepped their follow-up.

The first thing Psynoix did was shorten the name of the game to just Rocket League, realizing that Supersonic Acrobatic Rocket-Powered Battle-Cars was way too long, making it difficult to find in digital storefronts and search for online, as well as just sounding, well, kind of unprofessional. To help promote Rocket League, Psynoix also took advantage of something that wasn’t quite as prolific in 2008, “Let’s Play” videos and streaming. The company sent free copies to several prominent YouTube creators and Twitch streamers who could show their fans just how fun this new game could be.

Critics were happy with Rocket League, for the most part, calling it an improvement over SARPBC, particularly its graphics. However, once players started competing online the critical consensus changed, with the real delight of the game coming from its multiplayer. While SARPBC only sold 2 million copies in its lifetime, Rocket League sold 5 million copies in a month, far exceeding Psynoix’s expectations. After a year, that number grew to 6.2 million, with over 5.6 million pieces of DLC purchased. By 2018, over 50 million players had jumped into Rocket League, with an average of about 1 million players a day.

Rocket League was one of the most decorated games of 2015, earning multiple awards and accolades from various outlets. It would go on to spawn its own esports tournament, the Rocket League Championship Series, and it would be part of the 2017 Summer X Games, with the finals airing on ESPN3. Rocket League still continues to see success today, moving to a free-to-play model and even partnering up with FIFA for its esports tournament. In 2019, due to the massive success of Rocket League, Psynoix would be purchased by Epic Games, makers of Fortnite, adding to that company’s already stacked portfolio of video game properties.

From 2005, we’ve got the game Killer7, an action-adventure game from the eccentric developer Suda51. While not his first game, Killer7 is, at least in my opinion, the first time we got a game in the “Suda51 style”. Oddball characters, extreme violence, unorthodox gameplay, surreal events, all landmarks we associate with his later games, like No More Heroes and Shadows of the Damned.

Initially, Killer7 was to be part of the “Capcom Five”, a series of games that would release exclusively on the Nintendo GameCube. That deal, however, soured almost instantly, with the failure of 2003’s P.N.03, prompting publisher Capcom to pivot and allow these titles to also appear on Sony’s, much more popular, PlayStation 2.

The critical reception to Killer7 was mixed. There were some critics who appreciated the game for its artistry, praising Suda51 for his bold take on an action video game, while others found it to be boring, unpolished, and too “out there” for mainstream audiences. Worldwide, Killer7 would only sell about 240k copies, though it received good word of mouth from those that played it, leading to its cult status. Suda51 would go on to find major success in North America with No More Heroes in 2008, prompting players to revisit Killer7, hoping for a remaster or rerelease; they would finally get one, on PC, in 2018.

Our last game this week, from 1995, is the SNES strategy game Romance of the Three Kingdoms IV: Wall of Fire. This game series, along with Koei’s Nobunaga’s Ambition franchise, were often cited by critics in the 1980’s and early 1990’s as some of the most accomplished games of their era. While RotTK IV received positive reviews at launch, critics did begin to notice that not a lot had changed in the series. While the graphics were undoubtedly better, then core gameplay was still, for the most part, the same as it had always been.

Wall of Fire would later be ported to the Sega Saturn, Sony PlayStation, and PC, with this being the last game to get a PC release in North America until 2006’s RotK XI. A port of the game would release on the Wii & Wii U through the Virtual Console, and you can currently play it on the Super Nintendo app if you are a Nintendo Switch Online member.

Movies:

In notable movies, 2015 saw the release of Terminator Genisys, the fifth entry in the series that, according to producers, had nothing to do with the first four films. According to them, Genisys (with it’s stupid spelling), was not a reboot, a sequel, or a remake…it was a reimagining. During the 4th of July weekend, Genisys failed to beat two holdovers, Jurassic World and Inside Out, pulling in a paltry $42 million over a 5-day period. However, it wasn’t all bad news, there was money to be made. All the producers had to do was…reimagine…their target audience.

General apathy towards the Terminator franchise was at an all-time high, while the star power of Arnold Schwarzenegger was well past its prime. Around the world, though, Terminator Genisys was a HUGE hit, pulling in $400 million dollars and making it the first Hollywood film to make $100 million in China and not in the United States. While the worldwide box office was commendable, there was clearly no future for the Terminator franchise in America, and no sequel was green lit…oh, except for the 2019 reboot, which ignored Genisys, and it did EVEN worse. Don’t worry, there’s an animated series coming to Netflix soon.

From 2005, we’ve got the movie Fantastic Four, the first theatrically released film based on the popular Marvel comic. While fairly faithful to the comics, from a script co-written by Twin Peaks co-creator Mark Frost, Fantastic Four was eviscerated by critics who felt that its hokey style was no longer acceptable in a post Batman Begins world. A goofy script, poor CGI, and wooden acting put FF squarely in the “rotten” category on Rotten Tomatoes.

Despite the negativity, the film found an audience, earning over $300 million worldwide and opening up at #1 at the box office. A sequel, Rise of the Silver Surfer would arrive in 2007 but its poor performance would kill the series. A reboot would arrive in 2015, this time going for a more “serious” tone, failing spectacularly, with a 2025 release (which is connected to the Marvel Cinematic Universe) is hoping to finally give the world’s greatest heroes the treatment they so assuredly deserve.

1995’s notable film is the erotic sci-fi/horror film Species, where the very sexy Natasha Henstridge, who is a terrible actress, fucks the very much not sexy Alfred Molina, who is a great actor. Um, there’s some other stuff in there about how, like, this movie is a feminist film disguised as a “dude flick”, yadda, yadda. At one point Michael Madsen gets choked by tentacles that come out of the female alien’s tits. Truly, what feminists around the world were fighting so hard for. Oh, it made a shit load of money, a sequel came out, it flopped, then they made two more films that were shown only on the Sci-Fi Channel, which no one remembers; Species!

Albums:

Moving on to notable albums, one of my all-time favorite bands, Refused, put out a comeback album in 2015 called Freedom. It peaked at #161 on the Billboard Top 200 which, wow, I did not expect to read that, that’s incredible. In times of turmoil and distress, it’s bands like Refused that we can turn to as an outlet to express our rage, I implore you to do that now.

In 2005 we got the album Illinois (or maybe Illinoise), making fans of lo-fi, folk music go ape shit in the streets. Critics were, as you might imagine, went fucking NUTS over Illinois and called it, not just one of the greatest albums of 2005, but one of the best albums of the entre decade, and we were only five years in! This would be Stevens’ most successful album to date, peaking at #121 on the Billboard Top 200. Despite the critical love, it would fail to receive any Grammy nominations, likely shocking many white dudes with funny moustaches who write for Rolling Stone magazine.

Closing things out, from 1995, we’ve got the debut album from Foo Fighters called, well, Foo Fighters and, should probably come as no surprise, is one of my all-time favorites. The album was written and recorded (almost) entirely by Dave Grohl who was, at the time, best known for being the former drummer of Nirvana. Taking on the name Foo Fighters to hide his identity, Grohl gave tapes to anyone and everyone. In the aftermath of Kurt Cobain’s suicide and dissolution of Nirvana, Grohl played gigs with a few people and almost became the touring drummer for Tom Petty until he played Petty the Foo Fighters tape, who convinced Grohl to put together a band and try to be a success on his own.

With Grohl on guitar & vocals, he would enlist former Germs guitarist, and unofficial Nirvana bandmate Pat Smear as a second guitarist, with two former Sunny Day Real Estate band members, bassist Nate Mendel and drummer William Goldsmith rounding out the rest of Foo Fighters. With the band now signed to Capitol Records, a music video for the album’s second single, “I’ll Stick Around”, would be produced, giving the public their first look at this weird new band from the Nirvana drummer. To direct the video, Grohl requested Devo’s Gerald Casale, hoping that his surreal style would give the music video a “non-music video” quality.

With a well received appearance on David Letterman and two hit singles, Foo Fighters would debut at #23 on the Billboard Top 200, selling over 2 million copies, worldwide, by the end of 1995. Critics loved the album, comparing it favorably to Nirvana’s Nevermind and predicting that Grohl’s band may one day reach the same level of success. At the Grammy Awards, Foo Fighters would be nominated for Best Alternative Album, losing to Nirvana’s MTV Unplugged in New York.

While I absolutely love all of the singles from this album, “This is a Call”, “Big Me”, and “Alone + Easy Target”, my favorite track is “Good Grief”. This fast paced, punk influenced song really shines for me, showcasing Grohl’s obsession with Pixies-esque “loud-quiet-loud” song writing. One funny thing I found in researching this, a critic at Rolling Stone said that the youth of 1995 would dig Foo Fighters because it was like the grunge of Nirvana met the punk rock of Better Than Ezra; what? Anyway, Foo Fighters would, of course, go on to match the success of Nirvana and, arguably, surpass it, albeit with a form of music that has grown increasingly mainstream over the years. It’s hard to imagine Foo Fighters ever going back to the style heard on their debut, but it’s nice to know that we, as listeners, can always go back and give the record a spin.

Rocket League (PC/PS4) – Released Jul. 7^th, 2015

Killer7 (PS2/GameCube) – Released Jul. 5^th, 2005

Romance of the Three Kingdoms IV: Wall of Fire (SNES) – Released Jul. 1995

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Happy birthday, America!

Oh, and here’s my favorite song off of Foo Fighters, listen to it!

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