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

This week, mountain climbing, vampires and fantasy shootouts.

Re-Releases and Ports

Front Mission 3 Remake comes to PC, PlayStation and Xbox this week, after its release on Switch last year. A remake of the tactical mech RPG originally released for the PS1, it’s fairly faithful but does unfortunately seem to feature some AI upscaling.

Codemasters’ 2022 racing game Grid Legends is now on Switch 2. Drive around the world in touring cars, now with a fresh career mode as you take your racer through their career. The Switch 2 version includes all the DLC as standard.

Last year’s breakout hit Dispatch is now free from its PlayStation console exclusivity, as it is now on Switch 2 as well. This is the game from AdHoc Studio, founded by former Telltale devs, telling the story of a superhero dispatcher.

New Releases

Bento Blocks (PC) is a cute little puzzle game about packing food into bento boxes. You can make limited cuts and have to slot your food items into specific slots. Developed by Sometimes Limited.

The Spirit Lift (PC) is a deckbuilder roguelike (no wait, come back) set in a spooky hotel. Use your cards to battle the various challenges the hotel throws at you on each of its thirteen floors and hope you survive the night. Developed by Prettysmart Games.

Steel Century Groove (PC) is a game about making mechs take part in battles. Dance battles! Featuring a goofy story, upgradeable mechs and the ability to play your own songs, this is one of the silliest games released this week. Developed by Sloth Gloss Games.

Roots Devour (PC) sees you playing as a tree-dwelling Eldritch horror, using cards to extend your roots across the land. Use your roots to enthral and feed until the whole world is yours. Developed by Rewinding Games and published by Gcores Publishing.

Valkyrie Saga (PC) is a retro-styled open world game about playing a divine warrior who can swoop through the sky as you explore a series of floating islands. Looks very cute although I’m not sure it’s as period accurate to the PS1 as it claims as the draw distance doesn’t stop roughly four feet away from the camera. Developed by Public Void.

Don’t Stop, Girlypop! (PC) is a boomer shooter through the lens of a teenage girl’s PC from the 2000s. Built heavily around movement, as your speed increases how much damage you dish out. All with a glittery pink aesthetic. Developed by Funny Fintan Softworks and published by Kwalee.

Leaving Early Access this week, Speedball (PC, PS5, Xbox X/S) is a revival of the old Bitmap Brothers Amiga sports title of the same name, now developed by Rebellion. Control an augmented team of American football players in arenas full of deathtraps.

Earth Must Die (PC) is the newest point-and-click adventure from Size Five Games (Time Gentlemen Please, The Swindle, Lair of the Clockwork God) where you play an alien overlord who’s furious about his planet being invaded. Features an all-star cast including Green Wing‘s Tamsin Greig, Final Fantasy XVI‘s Ben Starr, Matthew “Garth Marenghi” Holness and Taskmaster’s Alex Horne (he was even in the announcement trailer). Published by No More Robots.

Space Warlord Baby Trading Simulator (PC) is the sequel to Strange Scaffold’s Space Warlord Organ Trading Simulator. As you may have guessed, the space warlords have gone from organ trafficking to child trafficking, as you trade alien babies on the open market and try to make as much money as possible.

I Hate This Place (PC, PS5, Xbox X/S) is a survival horror game based on the Image Comics series of the same name (three issues of which we have previously named Comic of the Week). Using a stylish art style clearly inspired by the comics, you must evade the horrors of Rutherford Ranch, crafting during the day and facing monsters at night. Uniquely, these monsters are most attracted to sound, so you can use that to your advantage. Developed by Rock Square Thunder and published by Feardemic and Broken Mirror Games.

Oh boy. There is Discourse. Highguard (PC, PS5, Xbox X/S) was announced as the big final reveal at The Keighleys, pushed heavily as the first game from Wildlight Entertainment, a studio founded by developers who had previously worked on Titanfall. However, the devs’ radio silence for the month that followed up to its launch this week has led to a lot of cynicism which has now manifested as review bombing, deranged frothing-at-the-mouth YouTube videos and a weird general sense of glee at its possible failure. Honestly, it looks…fine. It’s a 3v3 shooter set in a fantasy world and honestly I know very little else about it. Curious to see how it does long term though.

Code Vein II (PC, PS5, Xbox X/S) is the second in Bandai Namco’s postapocalyptic vampire Soulslike series (that may or may not be a secret God Eater spinoff). Still set in a world of humans turned into vampires or horrible monstrosities, you now travel through time looking for a way to prevent the calamity that brought so much ruin to the world. I enjoyed the first one despite my usual aversion to Soulslikes, so take that as an endorsement, I guess. Whether or not this one lives up to the original depends on whether or not you can give your character an oversized hat that clips through everything (as was my experience).

Game of the Week

Game of the Week is Cairn (PC, PS5), a mountain climbing game from Furi and Haven developers The Game Bakers.

You play as pro climber Aava, who has a dream to climb Mount Kami, a completely unconquered peak. You must be methodical in your climb, and do what you need to survive. The mountain is fairly open and free for you to navigate as you wish, but that doesn’t mean it’ll be easy.

The Game Bakers have a completely eclectic background, with none of their games being remotely similar, and yet their track record has been superb so far, so this immediately caught my attention with their involvement. It reminds me a lot of Jusant, another climbing game that proved to be incredibly compelling, only this is significantly more in-depth in its simulation. If the narrative proves to be as compelling as the central mechanic, this has the potential to be something great.