Game Industry News

Video gamers past and present should check out Atari 50: The Anniversary Celebration collection. Packed with 50 years of gaming history from Atari, this new collection of over 90 titles is more of a digital museum where you can play with the exhibits.

Tunic is an isometric action-adventure title with several gorgeous environments that at first glance brings to mind whimsical, Zelda-like gameplay. But beneath that exterior hides a truly hardcore title where everything in its mysterious and challenging world from its various environments, missions, and puzzles must be explored, uncovered, and solved.

Dwarven Skykeep combines a lot of different genres including real time strategy into a unique title filled with both excitement and cheeky fun. Prepare for tactical deck creation, RTS combat, puzzle solving and a lot of smart base building over a variety of challenging stages.

Those who play a lot of PC titles are used to wrestling with WASD keyboard and mouse controls, even if their keyboards are not specifically designed for these purposes. The Shrimp mechanical keyboard by contrast is specially designed for PC gaming above all else.

This week Modern Gamer Marie Brownhill takes on the role of caregiver in Animal Shelter Simulator. The game lets players feed, doctor and care for cute animals that need a good home. And the new puppies and kittens DLC adds even more adorable animals to the mix.

Realistically simulating how to fight fires and rescue people from burning structures is a surprisingly difficult task, which is why not too many firefighting simulation titles exist, especially not realistic ones. But Firefighting Simulator – The Squad does a good job in its depictions for both pros and amateur firefighters.

While Evil West does not really break the mold in terms of combat-oriented titles, it does offer a fun and adrenaline-fueled romp through an old western type of twisted universe where cowboy gunslingers take on undead vampire hordes with fists, gadgets and guns.

Pentiment is a visually striking game played in a colorful world that resembles inked medieval portraits. In this medieval narrative mystery, players take on the role of a 16th century struggling artist who is forced to also become an amateur detective in a storyline that spans decades.

Curse of Eternity is an action RPG that does its best to mimic a classic Dark Souls like experience for more modern gamers. And while it gets the harsh difficulty correct, bad control schemes and less than fluid mechanics really hamper its enjoyability.

Skeleton Crew is a dungeon crawler that is also a side scroller and a multiplayer platformer. There’s also puzzles and mysteries to solve, and even a bit of base building. All that makes Skeleton Crew worth checking out.

We covered the fun but flawed Pokémon Scarlet and Violet when initially released, but there is more than one fan of the series among the GiN reviewer crew. So, while Neal Sayatovich agrees with his colleague Vincent Mahoney, he still wants to offer his own take focusing on Pokémon Violet.

Those who like escape rooms will find a lot to enjoy about Do Not Open, which presents an entire mansion to explore and multiple escape room like scenarios. But there is one big twist. When you take too long to open the exit, a monster starts stalking around the halls to add one scary additional challenge.

This week Fresh Look Columnist Michelle Sayatovich is overjoyed because Apple Arcade subscribers are getting new mobile releases every Friday for the entire month of January 2023. And these new titles are just the recipe for combatting the winter blues. Check out her column about these newly released mobile games.

Movie Monday is a column by Michael Blaker covering various movies from the past. This week, he takes a look at a film from 2012 that stars Julianne Hough, Diego Boneta, and Tom Cruise called Rock of Ages.

GiN reporter and reviewer Colin Flanigan traveled to Lancaster, Pennsylvania to enjoy the annual TravellerCon USA convention. While there, he attended a show with the creator of the RPG, ran a game, and met with some devoted fans who keep playing in and advancing the Traveller RPG world. There is also an upcoming charity livestream that you don’t want to miss.

The three most popular genres right now for indie games are survival, roguelites and metroidvanias. But sometimes, developers find a mysterious way to mix all three genres and come up with something brilliant. In this week’s Save State column, Vincent Mahoney plays with a perfect example of that in Rogue Legacy 2.

The Game Over crew continue discussing AI news on their podcast.

This week the Trekker’s Delight crew discuss predictions about the upcoming season of Star Trek: Picard Season 3 and share other Trek talk.

Check out some of the top eSports events that both fans and professional players will be looking forward to in the coming year.