After the huge news of the Activision acquisition taking the centre stage last week, there wasn’t much room for any other gaming talk. But here we are with a fresh week, the dust has settled and games are still trickling through. There doesn’t appear to be any triple-A releases on the horizon until the beginning of February 2022. So you’ll have to make do with this bunch of indie gaming goodness instead!
Reverie Knights Tactics
Release Date 25th January 2022
Reverie Knights Tactics is a turn-based tactical RPG with strategic battles in isometric grids where every decision you make can alter the story and the way you configure the characters. Lead your party of heroes, each one with distinct, special abilities and skills, allowing you to use multiple battle strategies to defeat your enemies. Craft new items and accessories from the treasures you collect and use them to further customize your characters and gain a tactical advantage!
Cannibal Cuisine
Release Date 25th January 2022
Taking some inspiration from Overcooked without directly copying it, Cannibal Cuisine is the latest culinary experience on the gaming calendar. In up to four player local or online co-op you can work together to find delicious fruits and vegetables and combine them. Add freshly chopped and cooked tourists to fire up the appetite of God Hoochooboo. There is some violence within this indie so this may not be for the younger generation, but one to check out for us oldies.
Gav-Gav Odyssey
Release Date 25th January 2022
Gav-Gav Odyssey brings gamers back to the era of the 90s. The game took the best from several genres: platformers, scroll shooters and puzzles. Charming space dogs as the main characters, paired with witty puzzles, can drag on for hours! And the styling for sixteen-bit games looks so authentic that it seems as if he launched a previously unseen cartridge on the old lady “Mega Drive”. Nice graphics, clear gameplay and cute cutscenes are ideal not only for the younger generation, but also for “children over thirty” for whom the golden classics of video games are not an empty sound!
Summertime Madness
Release Date 25th January 2022
Summertime Madness is a single-player first-person puzzle game. The player, in the role of a painter who has made a deal with the devil, has to find his way back to the real world after being cheated and trapped into one of his canvases. A dreamlike journey into a surreal world of the artist’s own creations where the atmospheric gameplay provides mysteries to discover, puzzles to solve and artistic landscapes to explore.
You find yourself on an evolving island. As you investigate your surroundings, the island will start to change. The appearance of a ship, the rise of a lighthouse, each mystery you uncover and puzzle you solve will unfold new wonders and unveil new places to explore. But be forewarned, the scene you find yourself in, this breath-taking land of paint and oil is not always as straightforward as it appears. This intriguing world within the canvas holds more mysteries than even the artist intended.
Cake Invaders
Release Date 26th January 2022
The Japanese just love their famous German-inspired Baumkuchen cakes, and hungry invaders from across the universe have discovered these delicious treats too! Are you up to the challenge of protecting the precious desserts from waves of alien attacks? Save the cakes!!
Shoot to protect humanity’s valuable sweets from hungry alien swarms! Are you up to the challenge of protecting precious desserts from waves of alien attacks? The hungry invaders are approaching one after another, wanting the all-important Baumkuchen Cake carried by your spaceship for themselves.
Cogen: Sword Of Rewind
Release Date 26th January 2022
Awakening to find herself sprawled on a floor of hard steel, the first thing that greets Kohaku’s eyes is a strange talking sword named ExeBreaker. Unsure of where she is or what’s going on, she agrees to this sardonic sword’s proposal to join forces, and together they journey deep into the heart of a transformed Cogen City—once Kohaku’s home, now a collapsing ruin. Both mystery and mayhem await her, but with the power of ExeBreaker’s Ouroboros System on her side, nothing will stop her from discovering the truth of what happened to her beloved home.
Any hit you take is a death sentence in this side-scrolling 2D action game. But fear not! You may lack the HP to weather a beating, but you’ve got the Ouroboros System on your side. This futuristic technology kicks in the instant death embraces you and allows you to rewind up to 3 seconds of time. Slip up and wish you could take it back? Want to play around and experiment? Easy, just rewind the clock! Hone your skills through trial and error, and triumph over diabolical traps and legions of fearsome foes!
S.W.A.N: Chernobyl Unexplored
Release Date 26th January 2022
S.W.A.N.: Chernobyl Unexplored is a science fiction FPS puzzle horror game, which takes place a few months after the Chernobyl Nuclear Plant disaster.
Take part in the research expedition and be one of the first people to get inside the S.W.A.N. Institute since the reactor failure. You’ll discover the place kept secret by ZSRR authorities, omitted during the evacuation after the Chernobyl disaster.
Experience things that go far beyond the limit of human imagination. Face the danger locked behind the facility door. Find another expedition participant and discover the inhumane secrets of professor Kaydanovskiy – the founder of the facility.
Gunvolt Chronicles: Luminous Avenger iX2
Release Date 26th January 2022
Luminous Avenger iX 2 takes the series’ original speedy and stylish 2D action gameplay to the next level as Copen rips through enemies with his new “Break-Shift” form. His new destructive capabilities makes the high-speed action more satisfying than ever!
Active Neurons – Puzzle Game
Release Date 27th January 2022
Active Neurons is a game that trains spatial logical thinking.
By controlling the power of thought, you must charge neurons. The more charged neurons, the healthier our brain. The healthier the brain, the more fully-fledged life a person lives.
It would seem that the task is very simple, but no. To choose the direction of movement, the power of thought should be at rest, so it is important for you to correctly use obstacles on the levels. With 120 levels, more than fifteen types of unique mechanics and support for colour blindness mode. This bright and vibrant puzzler may just get your brain going.
Taiko no Tatsujin: The Drum Master
Release Date 27th January 2022
Available On Day One With Xbox Game Pass
Drum out high scores by playing along with Don and Ka in Taiko no Tatsujin: The Drum Master! Choose from over 70 songs and play with friends in local multiplayer mode and online ranked matches. Light your drumming spirit on fire!
Vagante
Release Date 27th January 2022
Vagante is an adventure set in a dark fantasy world filled with monsters, demons, and crooks. Despite these dangers, adventurers commonly travel these unforgiving lands questing for fame, riches, and power.
A recent rumour has it that a certain cave at the edge of the woods guards an unfathomable treasure. While a handful of intrepid adventurers have ventured into the cave already, none have returned. Undeterred by the potential danger, you set out by caravan to investigate…
Super Onion Boy 2
Release Date 28th January 2022
Super Onion Boy 2 is a 2D action and adventure game in retro style in pixel art.
Your mission is to save your friend who was captured by a terrible monster with psychic powers. Defeat enemies on the way with the help of superpowers and epic transformations, collect coins and stars to earn extra lives, find chests with magic potions and defeat all the terrible bosses until you reach the final boss.
After saving a princess from the clutches of a terrible monster, the Onion Boy wakes up in the forest and is not sure if everything was real or just a dream, he decides to go to the place where he saved her.
The Final Analysis
There is a huge whack of retro style titles this week with only one of this line-up hitting Xbox Game Pass. We have been spoilt rotten this month in terms of games and news in general and now it is time for some of the smaller games to shine in the spotlight. See you next week for what is on the horizon going into February 2022.
