Hello! Welcome to the latest Geeky Brummie Games Release Roundup!

This week, it’s not a lake, it’s an ocean. Also, some other things came out idk.

Apologies for the briefness of this week’s edition. There are more games out this week, but I got sidetracked, so here’s the abridged version featuring the biggest releases exclusively. And no, it’s not because of the Game of the Week. Well, okay, maybe it is a bit, as I keep looking over at my PS5 where it’s waiting while I write this.

Sorry, what was I talking about? Oh yeah, some games came out, I guess.

New Releases

In re-releases, we have the Metal Gear Solid Master Collection Vol. 1 (PC, PlayStation, Switch, Xbox X/S) which collects the first five Metal Gear games into a single package. That’s Metal Gear, Metal Gear 2: Solid Snake, Metal Gear Solid, Metal Gear Solid 2: Sons of Liberty and Metal Gear Solid 3: Snake Eater. Not a lot of remastering going on, instead it seems that most versions of these games are in the package somewhere, which is absurd. So if you’d like to revisit the adventures of Solid Snake (and his dad), this is for you.

The Lord of the Rings: Return to Moria (PC, PS5, Xbox X/S) is the latest attempt to milk the Lord of the Rings license for all its worth. It’s a survival crafting roguelike about dwarves delving into the Mines of Moria. Reviews are mixed on this one, but I guess that’s an improvement on the last LotR game (aka the trainwreck that was Gollum).

Ghostrunner 2 (PC, PS5, Xbox X/S) is the sequel to 2020’s excellent but brutally hard first-person cyborg ninja game. Just like the first game, expect a lot of parkour action where one hit kills are everywhere. This time they’ve added a motorcycle, so you can do bike parkour I guess. Sounds fun.

Cities Skylines 2 (PC) is the sequel to the indie classic that took over SimCity’s crown after EA botched the 2013 outing. You can expect more city building and management fun, if you’re super into traffic management and infrastructure planning (who isn’t?). However, be warned that players and critics alike have brought up some catastrophic performance issues, so check out some reviews first.

Game of the Week

Game of the Week this week is Alan Wake 2 (PC, PS5, Xbox X/S) which I’m sure surprises exactly no one.

The sequel to 2010’s survival horror about an author whose work comes to life around him, Alan Wake 2 shows us what’s happened to the titular author since then. Spoilers: it’s not great, and he’s trapped in a dark world. Meanwhile, the FBI are searching for him while also investigating some weird deer-head cult members. Things appear to get weirder from there.

Anyone who’s been reading these for a while already knows why this is here. While I was late to the party on the original Alan Wake, I jumped onto Control as soon as it released in 2019, and it got its hooks into me and became my Game of the Year for that year, by a long shot. And with its connections to Alan Wake, it’s got me deeply invested in the Remedy-verse, so I am very excited for this one.

Haven’t played any of it yet, but a big part of that is that its “midnight release” was exclusively tied to East Coast US time (ie. 5am for me), which I feel is a hate crime against me specifically. Thanks, Epic.