The GlobalESportNews editorial team presents their personal PC highlights from Xbox Showcase, Summer Game Fest and co.
The GlobalESportnews editors present their personal PC highlights from Xbox Showcase, Summer Game Fest and Co. – from Dimi’s wound to Steffi’s nostrils and Fabiano’s beard.
Even though E3 2022 fell through once again, we were flooded with a lot of exciting game announcements in the last few days: Summer Game Fest, Xbox Showcase and Co. washed ashore wave after wave of fresh trailers, info, reveals.
We took another dive for you and fished our personal favourites out of the big pool. Okay, enough splashy water flos(s)kles, have fun browsing! Feel free to tell us what you liked best in the comments.
By the way, the trade fair year is far from over! In addition to gamescom in August, many other exciting games events await you. In our big overview you can find out when and where you should tune in.
Table of Contents
Street Fighter 6
( Genre: Fighting Game – Developer: Capcom – Publisher: Capcom – Platforms: PC, PS5, PS4, Xbox Series X-S – Release: 2023)
Street Fighter 5 is like a wound that never heals properly. A scar that still burns from time to time six years later. Street Fighter 5 appeared as a construction site, an unfinished fighting game that monetised its supposedly free new content so aggressively and cheekily via in-game shops that I, as a “free” player (i.e. someone who only paid the regular purchase price), starved on the long arm. Sure, a lot has happened over time and Street Fighter 5 was already a really great fighting game at its core, but man, what a disappointing overall package that I could never find peace with.
Street Fighter 6 can and must change that! The first real gameplay trailer has been playing on continuous loop for days, the animations, the soundtrack, the art design, hach, this dream must not burst again like a razor on Zangief’s chest hair. Many fans are celebrating the new single-player mode, which probably works in a similar way to NBA 2K’s career – so I move freely in an environment, level up my fighter and look for challenges.
But I don’t really care. I just want a really good, new Street Fighter with arcade mode (I know, I’m asking a lot there), a clean multiplayer that ideally thinks a bit more modern in its rewards than many contemporary fighting games and lets me level up something so defeats don’t feel so crushing. Street Fighter 6 is welcome to focus on the basics – but please not like Street Fighter 5.
Redfall
(Genre: Multiplayer Shooter – Developer: Arkane Studios – Publisher: Xbox Game Studios – Platforms: PC, Xbox Series X/S – Release:2023)
Arkane is driving me crazy! As with Deathloop, I didn’t know what kind of game to expect after seeing the announcement trailer for Redfall. A multiplayer PvP shooter? A battle royal? Finally, however, the developer studio has shown gameplay of their new open-world game – and damn, am I in for it!
The loner in me is still sceptical about whether the game will really succeed in delivering a cool game experience in the usual Arkane sandbox manner in single player as well, since the focus seems to be on co-op play. On the other hand, Arkane always manages to surprise me because they are not afraid to try out unusual and perhaps even risky concepts.
Redfall catapulted itself into the top 5 of my most anticipated games with the new gameplay trailer. I can’t wait to take on the roles of the different vampire hunters alone or with friends and fight nasty bloodsuckers on the streets of the small town.
Saints Row – Boss Factory
(Genre: Action-Adventure (Character Editor) – Developer: Volition Inc. – Publisher: Deep Silver – Platforms: PC, PS5, PS4, Xbox Series X/S, Xbox One – Release: June 9, 2022)
I know I have soulmates out there: We’re the ones who spend more time in the character editor than in the game itself. Who click through all twenty nostril shapes before we decide on one. We fight our way through the untamed mod jungle just to find more cool hairstyles because we’re bored with the pre-made ones. And we roar with frustration when our painstakingly perfected visage looks totally stupid in the first cutscene. For us, Saints Row’s Boss Factory is a heavenly gift.
Perhaps the most versatile character creator of all has been available to everyone as a free standalone for a few days now. And with that, one of my dreams came true. I’m not the least bit interested in Saints Row, but since my colleague Vali has been raving about the great hero creation, I’ve been seriously considering picking up the game in a sale. Just to build cool characters. And now I don’t even have to spend money on it.
Of course, this is a clever marketing stunt that the developers want to use to lure us uninterested people into the game. And that’s absolutely fine. My personal hope is that many studios will learn from this and that such mega-editors will soon become the standard! Until then, I’ll be spending many hours in the Boss Factory crafting enough cyberpunky characters to populate half of Night City.
Persona 3 – 5
(Genre: JRPG – Developer: Atlus Software – Publisher: Sega – Platforms: PC, Xbox Series X/S, PlayStation 4, 5 – Release:From 21. October 2022 (for Xbox and PC)
Although the JRPG fans among us were left a bit in the dust, there was still a small ray of hope at Fake-E3, as Peter christened it: Persona 3, 4 and 5 are coming to Game Pass and thus also to the PC! Persona 4 was already released in 2020 with its Golden Edition on Steam and climbed the charts in no time at all!
Now Persona 5 Royal, the Special Edition, is coming to PC and as if that wasn’t enough to gladden my heart, Persona 3, which was last playable on PlayStation 3 and PSP, rounds out the trio. So soon you’ll have no excuse to play these truly grandiose JRPGs on the PC and enter the spooky parallel worlds of Japan.
By the way, you can play the three parts independently of each other. That means you don’t need any previous knowledge to plunge straight into the fun of the Shin Megami Tensei spin-offs with Persona 5 Royal from 21 October 2022. But until then, I’ll leave you with my second recommendation, which is probably more of an insider tip, but which is due to be released in summer 2022.
Starfield
(Genre: Role Playing Game – Developer: Bethesda Game Studios – Publisher: Bethesda Softworks – Platforms: PC, Xbox Series X/S – Release: 2023)
I really thought for a moment about what whacky little indie game I could name here. After all, with such collector’s articles there’s always an internal competition between the editors of the brand: who knows the most? Then I could have flaunted my insider knowledge here: “Yo, Cocoon is a totally cuddly puzzle game with a crazy portal mechanic! Lightyear Frontier is even something for people who don’t usually like survival and farming games! The Last Case of Benedict Fox looks like a gritty Ori!”
But in the end I decided that this time others should take the credit for their off-the-mainstream recommendations. Because this fake E3 has turned me back into a victim of the mass market. And this, when I should know better after the bitter personal disappointment called Fallout 4. But hey, please forgive me, Starfield admittedly looks simply awesome and offers exactly what I had hoped for with its spaceship battles, the editor and the hope of Bethesda-typical open-world finesse. At the latest after reading colleague Geraldine’s great (Preview), I can’t wait for the 2023 release. I can certainly pass the time until then with a hip indie game or two …
Anger Foot
(Genre: First-person shooter – Developer: Free Lives – Publisher: Devolver Digital – Platforms: PC – Release: 2023)
The brutal and over-the-top Stampede with the promising title convinced me so promptly with its trailer that I had to download the demo in no time. And what can I say: I am completely blown away! Anger Foot resembles Hotline Miami in its game principle and playful flow. With thumping basses in my ears, I free compact and entertaining levels from colourfully designed enemies and primarily resort to one “weapon”: my foot.
Anger Foot is fast, bitter and has a wonderfully biting sense of humour, as I am already used to from titles by the publisher Devolver. The fact that I, as a film fan, can find numerous allusions to the Broforce developer Free Lives only rounds off the whole experience. Anger Foot has the potential to become a really fun, albeit special shooter. It’s just a pity that it’s still a long time coming. Anger Foot is supposed to be released sometime in 2023, until then I’ll have to be content with the demo (which you can currently download for free on Steam).
The Lord of the Rings: Return to Moria
(Genre: Survival – Developer: Free Range Games – Publisher: North Beach Games – Platforms: PC – Release: Spring 2023)
I hate to admit it, but I am simple minded after all: I hardly love a fantasy world as much as Middle Earth and wish every day that there were more video games in this universe to look forward to. Of course, my highlight of the fair then is a rather unexpected announcement about a game that takes me back to the wonderful world from Tolkien’s pen! And not only that: The Lord of the Rings: Return to Moria also focuses on the small race of the bearded Haudraufs.
In the role of my very own dwarf, I return to the lost mine under the Misty Mountains at Gimli’s behest and am allowed to do here what the companions had far too little time for. For I do not simply have to pass through this dark place unscathed. Instead, I am allowed to completely search the (procedurally generated) tunnels, halls and corridors of Moria and, in the process, also ensure with other dwarves that the caves regain a little of their former glory.
From a purely graphical point of view, this game did not look like the next blockbuster. But in this case I didn’t care, because the game concept behind it just makes a lot of sense. I want to craft weapons, dig mines and build camps with dwarves! This race fits perfectly into such a survival game.
The Plucky Squire
(Genre: Adventure – Developer: All Possible Futures – Publisher: Devolver Digital – Platforms: PC, PS5, Xbox Series X/S, Nintendo Switch – Release:2023)
When asked what my personal gaming highlight of the past shows is, I don’t hesitate for a second and blithely write, “Hollow Knight: Silksong has finally come back with a new trailer and…” – but wait, something is wrong here. As my fingers pound the keys, resistance increasingly stirs in my heart. Quietly at first, but the further I get with my praise, the more torches are lit to drive Silksong heroine Hornet from the top of my most wanted list.
With success. The Plucky Squire is my true highlight! This game only revealed itself to me for a few seconds, yet it has already taken my heart by storm. What a phenomenal graphic style is this, please? How many creative ideas are thrown at me in just a few moments? How the hell am I supposed to be patient enough to wait until next year for this?
I’ve been constantly groping the back of my head since the reveal, looking for a hole. Because everything about The Plucky Squire just screams that someone has invaded my brain, opened the door marked “The perfect game for Sören” (not without ice-coldly tripping Hornet on the way there, of course) and is now just using everything in it as inspiration for this game.
You run across a desk and beat up cute minions in the best action RPG style. You hop into a book to experience further adventures on its pages. And the motif of a cup simply becomes the basis for a fun sidescrolling shooter. Can someone please freeze me and thaw me out for the release next year? I’ll write a quick apology letter to Hornet.
Warhammer 40k: Darktide
(Genre:Coop Shooter – Developer:Fatshark – Publisher: Fatshark – Platforms: PC, Xbox Series X/S – Release:13. September 2022)
Both Vermintide and Vermintide 2 have spent well over 100 hours. If you ring me out of bed in the middle of the night, I’ll find all the hidden tomes and grimoires in every level for you even today. So it’s no wonder that a new Vermintide in the Warhammer 40,000 setting was my personal highlight of the non-E3.
As a series veteran, you immediately notice that the developers are relying on the same framework for Warhammer 40,000: Darktide. With some of the close combat animations shown, I could have sworn that I had seen them somewhere before. But the great similarity also raises some questions for me.
What kind of maps will there be? The maps in Vermintide 2 were so beautifully varied, in Darktide we’ve only seen dark corridors so far. And does Fatshark manage to make autoguns, bolters and co. feel really powerful? While the melee system has always shone, ranged builds have always felt kind of unsatisfying to me in Vermintide.
I’m keeping my fingers crossed that the developers have learned from their mistakes: Less buggy maps and please patches and updates you don’t have to wait half an eternity for, thank you very much! Now bring on the flamethrower, I want to see filthy Nurgle scum burning.
The Callisto Protocol
(Genre: 3rd-Person-Shooter – Developer: Striking Distance Studios – Publisher: Krafton – Platforms: PC, PS5, PS4, Xbox One, Xbox Series X/S – Release: 02. 12.2022)
Starfield? The Last Of Us? Diablo 4? Fair enough, but what really threw me out of my gaming chair was the new trailer for The Callisto Protocol. Yes, I know, it’s not new and the trailer was relatively short. But as an incredibly big fan of the Dead Space series, even the smallest gameplay snippets set my RGB lights on fire. The first two parts of the cosmic horror taught me fear like hardly any other game has done before. Narrow corridors, grotesque creatures, a dense atmosphere and not to forget, the gruesome giant needle that gets drilled into your eyeball.
The real star, however, was the gameplay. Be it the creative weapons or the enemies that you have to tactically take apart to stop them from moving too fast on their feet. But what about Dead Space 3? When EA decided to give the brilliant survival horror a CoD makeover, garnished with a backtracking system straight from hell, the series said goodbye to me. Granted, the co-op mode was quite fun.
But that’s exactly why I’m incredibly looking forward to The Callisto Protocol. For one thing, the same people are working on the title again, and for another, they’re going back to the roots and leaving the third part of Dead Space to the left. And when I saw in the latest trailer from Summer Games Fest that even my beloved stomping move is back, I was completely hooked. At least until the Necromorph ripped half the poor guy’s head off.
Now it’s your turn! Let us know in the comments which game you liked best at the past fairs. Was it one from our list? Or are you most looking forward to a completely different title?
