A terrific 2D Ninja Gaiden, housefly bucket lists and other new indie games worth checking out
By far the biggest story in indie games over the last few weeks concerns payment processors pressuring the likes of Steam owner Valve and Itch to remove or de-index games that feature adult, NSFW and LGBTQIA+ themes. Under the guise of helping to protect women and children, an conservative activist group in Australia has taken credit for the delistings, as well as stricter rules regarding adult-themed games that Steam and Itch have implemented. But some affected developers suggest this is a smokescreen to push forward an agenda of anti-LGBTQIA+ censorship.
This week, Engadget senior editor Jess Conditt spoke with solo developer Cara Cadaver of Final Girl Games about the impact of the censorship campaign. Valve permanently banned Cadaver's new game, VILE: Exhumed , from Steam for allegedly depicting "sexual content with depictions of real people," though the developer says that assessment is inaccurate. While Cadaver and publisher DreadXP are working on alternative distribution for VILE: Exhumed , Steam is the go-to marketplace for many PC gamers and the ban cuts off what surely would have been a critical source of revenue for the game.
For its part, Itch has started reindexing free adult-themed games on its platform. The company has relied on Stripe and Paypal for processing payments. It has suspended payments via Stripe for 18+ content and it's talking to other potential payment partners "that are more willing to work with this kind of content." In any case, payment processors should not be the arbiters of morality, and they certainly should not be helping activists restrict access to perfectly above-board works of art.
One other piece of news that caught my eye this week is about a game jam that's taking place this month. Participants will have just over three weeks to make games based on real-life investigative reporting. According to Global Game Jam, the teams will gain access to exclusive reporting on organized crime and corruption from around the world and be able to ask journalists behind those stories questions about their work. It's a fascinating idea, and I'm really looking forward to seeing what the developers that get involved come up with. New releases
Ninja Gaiden: Ragebound is what I like to call a 'hell yeah" game. There are few purer joys than getting about 15-20 minutes into a new game and thinking 'hell yeah, this rules.' Even better, that feeling lasted through the other four hours or so I spent with Ninja Gaiden: Ragebound .
This is a throwback 2D hack-and-slash platformer from The Game Kitchen — the studio behind the Blasphemous series — and publisher Dotemu, which is building quite the reputation for itself as a purveyor of retro-style games ( Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Shredder's Revenge , the upcoming Marvel Cosmic Invasion ). Ninja Gaiden: Ragebound looks and sounds sumptuous, with gorgeous pixel art and stellar level, character and audio design. It's got combat that's somehow both sticky and slick, and it's challenging without being too frustrating.
I've had a tremendous time with this one, which, if memory serves me correct, is the first Ninja Gaiden game I've played. I can't really find any notable faults with Ninja Gaiden: Ragebound . It's well worth checking out. It's out now on Steam, PS5, Xbox Series X/S and Nintendo Switch.
Here's another 'hell yeah" game. I've been looking forward to Time Flies ever since I clapped eyes on it during a Day of the Devs showcase a couple of years ago. You play as a fly and the goal is to check off a bucket list of items before the insect perishes (their lifespan equates to the average life expectancy of a country of your choosing but in seconds).
It's a clever, funny and slightly rude — in a playful, Thank Goodness You're Here sort of way — blend of exploration and puzzle game that makes a strong case as to why we should make the most of our limited time. It's a short game, as it took me about 90 minutes to roll credits. That's pretty much the ideal length for this one.
The controls are simple (only a D-pad, pause button and a way to call up the bucket list are required) and the aesthetic, which features hand-drawn art, is delightfully low-key too. In fact, this would be a perfect fit for the Playdate, which just happens to come from Panic, the publisher of Time Flies . For now, though, you can check out this lovely little game from the team at Playables on Steam, PS5 and Nintendo Switch.
Whatnot Games released the 1.0 version Star Racer on Steam this week after over a year of early access. This is a retro racer very much in the vein of the F-Zero series that features local multiplayer (here's hoping for online multiplayer at some point) and music from Grant Kirkhope of Banjo-Kazooie and GoldenEye 007 fame. You can also create your own tracks and share them with others online.
I love the launch trailer for Star Racer , which blends gameplay with '80s-style animation. I also adore that — per Rock Paper Shotgun — one of the characters is a "detective-looking fella called Thrash Whiplash." If that's not in the running for the best video game character name of the 2020s, we're all going to need to take a long, hard look in the mirror.
We have yet another flavor of pretty, retro-tinged pixel art this week thanks to developers Ancient Corporation and Bitwave Games, as well as publisher Limited Run Games. Their 16 bit-style shoot-'em-up Earthion landed on Steam this week.
It features music from legendary composer Yuzo Koshiro ( Streets of Rage, ActRaiser, Shenmue and many more games). That probably should not come as a huge shock given that he co-founded Ancient.
Earthion is also slated to hit consoles starting in September. Being a Limited Run title, physical editions are of course on the way for PC, PS4, PS5, Xbox Series X and Nintendo Switch. Expect those later this year. A physical version is also expected for Sega Genesis/Mega Drive in 2026.
Surgent Studios went in a completely different direction for its follow-up to its well-received Metroidvania from last year, Tales of Kenzera: Zau . Its latest project (released with the help of the publishing arm of Palworld creator Pocketpair), Dead Take , is a first-person psychological horror about an actor who is looking for a friend who has vanished after a Hollywood party.
There's top-tier videogame acting talent here, with Neil Newbon (Astarion in Baldur's Gate 3 ) and Ben Starr (Clive Rosfield in Final Fantasy XVI ) taking on the lead roles, and a litany of other well-known performers — from Laura Bailey to Sam Lake — also making appearances. That cast alone makes this worthy of attention. Dead Take is out now on Steam and the Epic Games Store.
It feels like we've been waiting forever for Hobbit life sim Tales of the Shire: A The Lord of the Rings Game to drop and, following some delays, it's now available on PS5, Xbox Series X/S, Nintendo Switch and Steam. (This is now technically an indie game because Take-Two sold off publisher Private Division last year.)
I love games that tell you exactly what they're about in their title and A Game About Digging A Hole sure is one of those. You dig a hole, find buried goodies, and sell them to help you buy better gear.
Developer DoubleBee and publishers Rokaplay and Headup brought this exploration game to iOS and Android this week after a hugely successful debut on Steam earlier this year. A Game About Digging A Hole has now sold more than 1 million copies.
Perhaps you're looking for a different digging game to check out this weekend. In that case, Mashina may be worth considering. The titular character is a robot that searches for valuable minerals to help repair and expand her community. Mashina can also use the minerals to build machines that can help with her digs, while she can use items she stumbles upon for base decoration.
Developers Jack King-Spooner and Talha Kaya (who previously released Judero ) used traditional stop-motion techniques to animate Mashina . This charming-looking puzzle/exploration game is now available on Steam.
Let's wrap up this section with a short, experimental game about anxiety. A Dream About Parking Lots has been out on Steam for a few months and the aptly named Interactive Dreams (with the help of Take It Studio!) brought it to PS5, Xbox Series X/S and Nintendo Switch this week. It's said to be based on real dreams and will see you looking for your car among parking lots and mazes while chatting with a therapist. Upcoming
Wander Stars — from Paper Castle Games and publisher Fellow Traveller — was supposed to be arriving this week, but the developers have pushed the release date back until September 19. The team wants to carry out some changes to improve the game following feedback from an open beta.
I really like the look of this one, and though turn-based combat isn't usually my cup of tea, I'm very intrigued by the system that's in use here. You'll find and combine words into phrases that convert into devastating attacks. There are more than 200 words and they have cooldowns, so combining them in smart ways will be a key to success. Using words "with honor" can seemingly help you unlock more useful phrases too. Very curious to see how all of that works in practice. We'll get a better idea next month, when Wander Stars lands on PS5, Xbox Series X/S, Nintendo Switch and PC.
Speaking of games with a killer look, a gameplay trailer for I Hate This Place hooked me in this week. This is an isometric survival horror game that pulls from the visual stylings of its comic book origins. Crafting is vital here, both in terms of your arsenal and strengthening your shelter before nightfall. This stylish title from Rock Square Thunder and publisher Broken Mirror Games is bound for PC, PS5, Xbox Series X/S and Nintendo Switch later this year.
If you buy something through a link in this article, we may earn commission.
Hashtags
Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
Digital Trends
4 hours ago
- Digital Trends
Is Battlefield 6 cross-platform?
Every online multiplayer shooter these days needs to have cross-platform support to stand a chance, but Battlefield 6 might as well be dead on arrival without this functionality. This is because, unlike games like Borderlands 4 or Gears of War: Reloaded, multiplayer matches in Battlefield 6 will feature 64-player warzones. That's a huge lobby to fill if the game is only matching you with other players on PS5, Xbox Series X/S, or PC. Before you pick your class and prepare to experience the destructive multiplayer waiting in Battlefield 6, I'll give you the sitrep on its cross-platform support. Is Battlefield 6 cross-platform? First reported by Eurogamer, it is confirmed that Battlefield 6 will feature full crossplay support on all platforms. Unlike the last entry, Battlefield 2042, this game will not be available on last-gen systems. That means crossplay will let you squad up with friends across PS5, Xbox Series X/S, and PC. For those who wish to only play with others on their specific platform, the option to disable crossplay will be available. Sadly, it was also confirmed that Battlefield 6 won't be coming to the Switch 2. Recommended Videos As far as why Battlefield 6 will be skipping the Switch 2, Vince Zampella stated that the core Battlefield fanbase is on PS5, Xbox Series X, and PC. Battlefield 6 will also have full cross-progression support. This means players will be able to take all their progress, including skins, ranks, guns, levels, and more, from one platform to another. You will still need to purchase the game on additional platforms, but at least you won't have to start the grind over if you do want to play on two platforms. With nine maps at launch and a return to the classic class-based structure, cross-platform support was the last missing piece Battlefield 6 needed to set itself up for success when it launches on October 10, but you can get a taste of the action early by playing the beta test in August if it isn't too late.
Tom's Guide
12 hours ago
- Tom's Guide
Nvidia Remix is bringing my favorite PC classics back to life — 5 games I can't wait to play
We're well into an age of remasters, remakes and remake-quels, some worth waiting for (Silent Hill 2 comes to mind), some not so much (GTA: The Trilogy still hurts). But there are still many classic games stuck in limbo that are awaiting the proper touch-up they deserve, and Nvidia Remix is here to try and fill that void. Nvidia's modding platform is now out in the wild, allowing modders to use Team Green's RTX technology to remaster classic PC games using DirectX 8 and 9. Basically, those old titles that struck a chord that we'd love to return to, now with a visual overhaul fitting for modern graphics. Now, it's not as simple as pushing a button in RTX Remix to add ray tracing, DLSS 4 and hyper-realistic graphics, as there's still a lot of work that goes into giving older PC games a glow-up. But it does make the process of building a remaster for a bunch of favorites easier. We've already seen the Half-Life 2 RTX demo in action (and what a haunting visual upgrade that delivers), but what else is in store? Well, I wanted to put this RTX 5080-equipped Acer Predator Orion 7000 gaming PC to work, and started hunting for RTX Remix games over on Steam — but you won't find many there. Instead, modders have been showing off their glorious RTX Remix remasters over on ModDB, letting gamers test out their work on some of my favorite classics: Star Wars: Republic Commando, Max Payne, Bioshock and plenty more. These aren't full-fledged releases, and it may be a while before we see any of these titles come to be easily downloadable on Steam, even if they are just demos. But after seeing what RTX Remix can do firsthand, I can't wait to see these titles gain a second life. Head over to ModDB to find RTX Remix games currently available to try out, which are part of an RTX Remix Mod Contest. But be warned: these require you to download and extract files in PC games you own, and they won't always work. Through trial and tribulation, I only managed to try out one game, despite following installation instructions from modders. These are still a work in progress, but are continuously updated. If you're used to putting mods in games, try these out! This is the one (and only) game I was able to get running, but I was glad to play it all the same. Star Wars: Republic Commandos unbelievably just hit its 20th anniversary, and despite its short length, it's still my favorite Star Wars game, well, ever (it helps that I'm an FPS diehard). Get instant access to breaking news, the hottest reviews, great deals and helpful tips. From creator Chaos007, this RTX Remix mod for Star Wars: Republic Commando started out as a quick experiment to see what the tactical first-person shooter would look like under all those RTX enhancements. But the demo is catching steam, and it really brings out the shine that I remember the game having when it first launched. Right from the opening cinematic, I could clearly see the fully ray-traced lighting shining off the clones' helmets and armor, only to be further impressed by the updated droid models I was shooting down with the DC 17 Rifle, blasting beams of light. The landscape of the first level also received texture upgrades, making it look far brighter and losing that dull, unsaturated "brownness" we got a lot of back when it was booming in many 2000s games. It's not perfect, nor is it meant to be, since it's a project still being worked on. There were patches of light that didn't add up, and some of the visually old-looking explosions from droids didn't mesh too well with the rest of the upgraded textures. Plus, it only works with the Tactical Visor Mode turned on, so no usual helmet view here. But seeing the potential RTX visual overhaul Star Wars: Republic Commandos can get, it would happily return to lead my team of weapons — I mean, commandos. Replaying Max Payne is almost like a tradition to me (even going through that dastardly Nightmare Maze). Falling in slow motion with its iconic Bullet Time and firing off rounds while wielding dual handguns never gets old. So, getting a glimpse of its RTX enhancements just makes me more excited for my near-annual replays. This Max Payne RTX remaster comes from creator Noodle, with the mod being in full show during the game's opening act. Along with RTX lighting giving the game a more modern shine, there are updated hand-crafted PBR (Physically-Based Rendering) materials, essentially physically accurate objects, along with a newly modeled and textured train. But bringing path-traced lighting into the fold gives Max Payne a more realistic glint. It does raise the overall brightness of levels, especially the train station, which may seem at odds with the game's overall "dark noir" vibe. But actually, it deepens the immersion, making those lifeless, illuminating lights throughout the train station seem more dreary rather than upbeat. It continues to be worked on, with more PBR materials and the like planned to arrive. The work being done on this Need For Speed: Underground RTX mod is quite simply incredible. I mean, it's the game as I remember it being, even though the original has none of the highly polished textures, natural-looking reflections beaming off the cars as they rev through a night-lit city and overall visual smoothness. Even though it's over 20 years old (it was released in 2003), creator alessandro893 has made it into a modern PC title that I would be impressed by in today's standards (not quite the level of Forza Horizon, but you catch my drift). The ray-traced visuals bring a further element of realism to the game, and racing through the streets is the modern-day nostalgia trip I crave. So far, you'll find a completely overhauled Chinatown to drive through, over 500 new PBR textures and 30 new highly textured 3D models, like buildings and trees. I consider Portal 2 to be the perfect game, and even today, I'm still impressed by the visuals it offers despite it coming out in 2011. But I'm all for updated textures and ray tracing, and that's what this Portal 2 RTX remaster from creator skurtyyskirts aims to achieve. Everything gets the full RTX treatment here, with complete path-traced lighting for physically accurate lighting and shadows throughout all the deadly Aperture Science testing labs. Virtually every asset gets a PBR material overhaul and objects are completely remastered with hand-crafted (virtually crafted?) with AI upscaling. There's even high-fidelity, redesigned portal walls to get excited about. I suppose what I'm most excited about, though, is seeing a highly textured GLaDOS imbued potato at the end of my portal gun. That opening shot of Rapture in Bioshock is iconic, and the same creator of the Portal 2 RTX remaster, skurtyyskirts, along with watbulb, looks to give that same level of awe with this Bioshock RTX remaster. But it also wants to make a more stable-performing game on PCs overall. It's still in the early stages, and there isn't much to check out, but the duo aims to provide the same full real-time path tracing with a complete PBR asset overhaul by utilizing RTX Remix. So, instead of using an AI upscaler, the mod will use recreated assets to provide a more modern take on the game. So far, that includes the "grand halls of the Kashmir Restaurant to the smallest pieces of debris on the ocean floor." Impressively, the mod also makes performance improvements, unlocking the game's Havok physics engine, which has been locked at 15 FPS, and pushes it up to 90 FPS. Plus, as stated by the creators, the frame rates have been pushed further in areas of the demo, which reach up to 350 FPS on an RTX 5080 at 1080p resolution. If these RTX Remix-enhanced PC games break cover and see a full release on Steam, I'll be all over them. If you can, try them out and give them some attention, and hopefully, we'll see even more titles get the RTX Remix treatment. Follow Tom's Guide on Google News to get our up-to-date news, how-tos, and reviews in your feeds. Make sure to click the Follow button.
Yahoo
16 hours ago
- Yahoo
Dragon Quest 1 & 2 HD-2D Remake won't have an upgrade or cross save on Switch 2, making the JRPG's game-key card your only physical option
When you buy through links on our articles, Future and its syndication partners may earn a commission. Square Enix has confirmed that there won't be an option to upgrade Dragon Quest 1 & 2 HD-2D Remake on Nintendo Switch to a Switch 2 edition. Dragon Quest 1 & 2 HD-2D Remake was recently confirmed to be coming to Nintendo Switch 2 alongside the announcement of its October release date alongside the PC, Xbox, PS5, and Switch, which Dragon Quest 3 HD-2D Remake released on last year. While the remake of Dragon Quest 3 was only 7.7GB, Square Enix confirmed that the 1 & 2 remake will be on a game-key card, but there's even worse news for Switch 2 players who want a physical copy. In a FAQ on the Dragon Quest website Square Enix confirms that the Switch 2 and Switch versions of Dragon Quest 1 & 2 HD-2D Remake won't be cross-compatible. If you wanted to buy a physical Switch copy of the game to play on your Switch 2, you can play it, but "it will perform as it would on a Nintendo Switch," so if you wanted to play it with the Switch 2 performance improvements you're out of luck. Square says that there won't be an upgrade path available for Dragon Quest 1 & 2 HD-2D Remake from Switch to Switch 2, meaning you'll need to buy the Switch 2 version if you want to play that version. Not only that, but there won't be cross-save between both versions either. This, mixed with the fact there's no actual physical release of Dragon Quest 1 & 2 on Switch 2, instead being a game-key card, makes it a complete bummer for Switch 2 owners. Our GamesRadar+ preview of the remake said "these lovingly made refreshes are shaping up to be a wonderfully accessible way to experience a crucial piece of gaming history," so it sounds like a worthy remake, it's just a shame there's no good way to get a Switch 2 version physically. Chrono Trigger and Xenogears writer "actually hated" video games before discovering Dragon Quest: "That concept really stunned me."
