After the slew of announcements that came over the last couple of weeks, the start of March has been pretty subdued in video gaming circles. OK, so there were the PSVR game reveals mid-week, but they weren’t worthy of a State of Play stream, and so the week’s news was dominated by Switch Pro rumours, and controversies surrounding Hogwarts Legacy and The Sinking City.
If you’re just wanting to play some games, though, PlayStation Plus absolutely had you covered this week, giving away Final Fantasy VII Remake, Maquette, Farpoint and Remnant: From The Ashes in a bumper month of freebies. Make sure to snap them all up! Oh, and Ratchet & Clank on PS4, which is free for all PlayStation users.
In the News This Week
- Report: The Nintendo Switch Pro will feature a 7″ OLED display with production starting this summer
- Aliens: Fireteam announced for PlayStation, Xbox, and PC
- Fall Guys developer Mediatonic is now part of Epic Games – what does this mean for Fall Guys?
- Next-gen Need for Speed delayed as Criterion joined Battlefield 6 team for 2021
- Doom 3: VR Edition is coming to PSVR this month
- I Expect You To Die 2 comes to PSVR and PC VR later this year
- Valve cancel Artifact 2.0 reboot, make Artifact Classic and Artifact Foundry free-to-play
- Report: Hogwarts Legacy will have trans-inclusive character creation options
- The Sinking City delisted from Steam in Frogwares–Nacon dispute and Nacon fires back at allegations
- The PlayStation Plus March 2021 downloads are now live – Get Final Fantasy 7 Remake, Maquette & more
Games in Review
There wasn’t a huge number of reviews this week, but those we did review were well worth the time.
- Closed Hands – PC, Mac, Lin – 9/10
- Curious Expedition 2 – PC – 9/10
- Maquette – PS5, PS4, PC – 8/10
- Loop Hero – PC – 8/10
- Mutropolis – PC – 7/10
- Slay the Spire – iOS, And – 7/10
- PixelJunk Raiders – Stadia – 6/10
- A Tale of Paper – PS4 – 6/10
- Shakes on a Plane – NSW, PC – 5/10
- Nuts – NSW, iOS, PC – 4/10
- Moving Out: Movers in Paradise DLC – PS4, XBO, NSW, PC – 9/10
And we had a solitary hardware review with a pair of gaming oriented true wireless earbuds:
EPOS GTW 270 Hybrid Wireless Earbuds – PS, NSW, PC, iOS, And – 7/10
Featured Articles
We accompanied the reviews with a great set of previews, features and other articles this week, with two of the highlights being previews of upcoming games. Playing in co-op with Dom, I called It Takes Two a fantastical co-op adventure that can make (or break) a relationship, and followed it up with a wide-ranging interview with writer and creative director Josef Fares.
Later in the week, I followed that up with the surrealist Eternal Cylinder, in which you mutated Q*berts are hunted by an evil rolling pin, while Drea previewed Story of Seasons: Pioneers of Olive Town.
David Carcasole looked back on Sony’s last handheld on its 9th birthday, saying the PlayStation Vita deserved so much better, while Tom Hughes looked at what The Legend of Zelda could learn from Rogue Heroes, and Dani Cross stated that Legends of Runeterra is still the best digital card game.
Finally, What We Played featured Loop Hero, Overwatch and The Pathless.
Trailer Park
Aliens: Fireteam announced for PlayStation, Xbox, and PC
Super Smash Bros. Ultimate Pyra/Mythra two-in-one fighter DLC is out now
Deathloop’s time loop gameplay explained in this new trailer
Doom 3: VR Edition is coming to PSVR this month
For Honor Year 5 Season 1 readies for battle next week
Your Achievements
Here’s what you in our community has been up to this week:
- Now that it’s been fixed, camdaz has been back to Dirt 5 and its voluminous career.
- The same can’t be said for MrYd, who’s finding that Dirt 5 still has freezing issues, so he’s worked through the PS+ games (except for FF7R, which he already played), alongside World War Z, AC Valhalla and finishing off Maneater.
- With little time to play, Andrewww finished a second playthrough of Resident Evil 2 and finished off the New York expansion for The Division 2 while dabbling with other games.
- willbuchanan snapped up the Far Cry New Dawn platinum and is tempted to do the same for Far Cry 3 platinum. While he weighs up that decision, he’s plugging away at Everybody’s Golf on Vita.
That’s all for this week’s gaming round-up. As always, have fun at home, stay safe if and when you’re out, and we’ll see you next week.
