Summer Game Fest 2021!

Yesterday, the Summer Game Fest was kicked off and I honestly completely missed that it wasn’t today until I saw Bel’s post on it already having had happened (Is the grammar alright? I feel like it’s alright? In my head that works, right? Right? Right. Right!), so check out his post, and essentially, we watched most of it on-stream today and I enjoyed it. I completely missed a title but caught up on the beginning section because I apparently skipped too much from the beginning sequence and missed something truly magical. Anyways! I wanted to talk about the Summer Game Fest today and honestly, it was cool. I’ve never watched any of these game shows and stuff like the E3 or whatever… so this was a truly new experience for me and I’m glad I got to experience it with my community over on Twitch.

So, it’s basically like a Game Awards show but with Game Trailers and Announcements and without Game Awards… At least that’s what I got from Bel’s post (give it a read!) and honestly, that summarises it quite well. The host was Geoff Keighley who apparently also produced it and I’ve never heard of him before but apparently, he’s a game journalist who made it and hence, I respect him… kinda… I think… At least until I do more research on him. If he turns out to be a dickhead, I’ll call him Geoffrey instead. Anyways.

Uhm, most of the show was kind of cringy with Geoff entering the screen every now and then and saying a few words and cracking some jokes and honestly, I couldn’t care less. Instead, I decided to skip ahead to the important bits and it was fun to hear “World Premiere” a bunch of times with a new movie by Ryan Reynolds and a bunch of titles that I don’t care about… I mean, Death Stranding is still on my to-buy/to-play list and I guess I’ll get the Director’s Cut instead of the normal version but that’s so far in the future… I may as well wait until Epic Games gives it away for free. Uh, Tarkov was also there and was seriously underwhelming, showcasing a lot of shooting that was very long and very unsatisfying. I don’t know whose idea that was. But there were also some interesting releases there… and some information on some of the titles. The last 2 hours of the show essentially are about the “Day of the Devs” presenting most of the gems that I was looking forward to. Everything before that? Was hit or miss for me, at least.

Before I head into the interesting titles, I wanted to mention that I was super excited about five titles here: First up, I was hoping to see more gameplay trailers or whatever of Stray which is published by Annapurna Interactive and is supposed to come out in 2021, as far as I know,… and I also published a post on that in the past… Second up, I was hoping to see a trailer of sorts for the teased/leaked Outer Wilds DLC… Third up, I have seen the Endless Dungeon trailer already but I still wanted to see more about it by Amplitude Studios… I may actually publish another post on that soon… Fourth,… I was really looking forward to seeing more about Sable which is published by Raw Fury. Last but not least, I was really excited about the prospect of potentially getting more information about Tunic which is published by Finji and which I played at the GamesCom two years ago! Let’s see how much I actually got out of this event information-wise and hype-wise!

As mentioned just now, I’m really excited about Sable. It’s developed by Shedworks and published by Raw Fury. Really excited to see another exploration-based game in the works and frankly, it’s beautiful. The presentation of the game was amazing with the game-trailer kind of blending in with the stage and Japanese Breakfast singing the song Glider from the game’s soundtrack (Geoff said a lot of words and promoted her a lot in a single sentence… a very long sentence… so not entirely sure here…?). It was really pretty… and her voice was amazing and the singing and everything, so well done on that part, I just would have wanted to see more information on the game, the story, the characters, and maybe even some talk from the devs.

I forgot to mention that I now after watching the VOD and after reading Bel’s post realised that I missed Tiny Tina’s Wonderlands. I’ve caught up and it’s honestly quite great. I’m really excited to play that spin-off as it features Tiny Tina (who’s great) from the Borderlands franchise and basically combines Borderlands’ madness with the DnD-campaign from that one BL2-DLC and I’m really looking forward to that, although I have yet to finish said DLC… or the other DLC I own… and I still need to play BL3! So, it’s gonna take a while until I get it.

Lost Ark looks super awesome but I don’t think I’ll sink my teeth into it just yet… I may have to wait until the reviews come in. Naithin just published a post on it saying that they won’t take his money. I’m sure you’ll like that post! I personally love ARPGs but I really need to have a group of people to play it with… so I’ll have to see if any of my friends get into it.

Initially, I wanted to mention that I’m surprised that the Among Us hype doesn’t die out… but I’m not surprised… I just don’t play it personally anymore which means nothing in the grand scheme of things. However, Finji just published Chicory: A Colorful Tale which looks cute but it’s not my type of cute. It’s interesting but I’m not sure if I personally wanna get into it. I’d love to see people play it though, just not my cup of tea, I guess. Salt and Sacrifice is gonna be the new game by the Salt & Sanctuary devs where you hunt down and consume mages… It reminded me of Vigil which is understandable since the Vigil people were inspired by Salt & Sanctuary but honestly, I’m not sure if it will be my type of game as the art style is really not my cup of tea.

BUT we’ve got something new here that is really to my liking: Solar Ash! Published by Annapurna Interactive (I’m such a fanboy) and developed by Heart Machine, this title basically plays kind of like Shadow of the Colossus. It looked super cool and I’m sure you’re gonna love it when you see it, too. It’s the second game by the team behind Hyper Light Drifter and I feel like it went through the same transformation that Risk of Rain went through: First game = 2D Pixel Art, Second Game = 3D Cell-shady stylised awesomeness. Really cool! The world is stunning, the soundtrack sounds good so far but I’m really excited about the prospect of something Shadow of the Colossus like… on PC. At least, it already has a page on Epic Games, not sure if it will be an exclusive title though!

Tarkov’s trailer was just “BRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRR BRRRRRRRRRRRRRR BRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRR” aka “gun goes vrrrrr” and it was very underwhelming and boring and I couldn’t skip ahead fast enough sadly… I don’t know who they’re trying to win over with that sort of trailer but that was disappointing, even for someone like me who’s not in the game and expected more of a Tarkov trailer. Is there anything new? Probably… I don’t know… The Trailer was all about shooting into a corridor for what felt like ten hours straight. Meanwhile, the gunplay just felt off… Next up there was also Two Point Campus which basically looked… not good? I don’t know how to describe this impression but Two Point Hospital had the curious diseases and the management aspects and Two Point Campus seems to miss out on that… or at least it doesn’t tell you about any of that… and it just felt as if something was amiss but it’s hard for me to describe this feeling I have here.

BUT there’s an amazing game right here that reminded me of Left 4 Dead but in space?! It’s like Back 4 Blood… BUT IN SPACE! The Anacrusis looks amazing and like a lot of fun. It was hilarious and crazy and looked intense and in theory, it should have a lot of replayability where you fight off against hordes of zomb- ALIENS! ALIENS! LOTS OF THEM! A LOT OF ALIENS! And you yeet them off into the distance, move forward, shoot them, plough through them, kill them, yeet them some more, push them away, pull them in, and all of that… Looked like a lot of fun!

Planet of Lana was the next game of interest here where you have a small pet of sorts and you’re a boy… and it’s this beautiful and interesting hand-painted world that you explore in what felt like a Limbo-ish game that doesn’t murder you around every corner. It’s interesting. I got very *drawn* (ba dum ts) into it and am looking forward to this. We also got a trailer for Paladins (which apparently still exists?) and I loved the song in there but I can’t find out what the song is… big sad… didn’t care about the trailer itself. Can someone help me find out what that song is? Thanks! 

Next up, we got a trailer on Endless Dungeon (HELL YEAH!). I saw the trailer already and was hoping for more information but whatever… We also got more information on Tunic and the fact that there will be a bigger demo soon available to us all, which is great. I have high expectations for that demo… I mean, as in my expectations are that this demo will be better than the last Steam Game Festival demo… It was a buggy mess after all and unplayable when I tried it out and I hope that the next one is playable. The GamesCom demo that I played was amazing btw and it was nice to hear some insights about the inspirations for the game… Cute Zelda-lite where you’re a fox and where exploration and discovery are meant to be very satisfying… Up my alley! Looking forward to this next demo!

Tribes of Midgard is something I haven’t seen at all yet… It reminded me of a Valheim X Drake Hollow cross-over as in the DH-formula of building your village, upgrading your gear, exploring the world and fighting off waves meets the lore and style of Valheim, sort-of? Kind of reminded me of Fade to Silence as well and honestly, it really looked cool and I’m looking forward to potentially getting into this… again if I have a group of friends that are getting into it. :) May need to do some convincing! Elden Ring was… it looked intense and awesome and I’m hyped about it but I wasn’t really aware of it until now btw.

We also got some more information on Phantom Abyss which is great. It’s this roguelike-dungeon-crawling game where you see the Phantoms of players before you conquer the dungeon but if you die, you get locked out and can’t see that dungeon anymore… and if you beat it and claim the treasure, nobody else gets the spoils of war. I feel like the concept is amazing but if some people were very good at it, they could lock a dungeon and ruin the experience for anyone that tries that same dungeon, if that makes sense? Maybe I’m overthinking this or maybe there is a mechanic that stops stuff like that but I’m excited regardless of that.

Next up we got more information on Garden Story (nice to see more gameplay trailers), TOEM (super excited but no new info), Soup Pot (looked cool but no new info), Vokabulantis (some behind-the-scenes stuff but it’s stop-motion and while I love seeing the behind-the-scenes stuff I would have liked to see more actual gameplay), as well as some more information on Death’s Door (interesting… but again, nothing new). I would have liked more actual gameplay footage for most of these titles but can’t be helped, I guess. The Wandering Village looked very interesting and has been wishlisted. Unbeatable also made an appearance. What was exciting was the new insights on Loot River… The premise was already super cool but seeing the new weapons, a bit of info on the level generation, the bosses, and the characters, as well as some more gameplay stuff, was very nice and I’m still super hyped for this one. And at last, there was Behind The Frame which is this anime-ish visual-novel-ish game that is super cute and wholesome and I’m excited to see it get published eventually…

But there was no more information on Stray and/or Outer Wilds, which was a bummer, but we got to see more Endless Dungeon, Sable, and some Tunic, so that’s cool. Game Shows like this are weird in a way where you hope for things and don’t get those but you learn about new things that you get very excited about. I for once am super excited about Sable, Endless Dungeon, Behind The Frame, Loot River, and Solar Ash. Seeing two more additions to my roster of interests (Solar Ash and Behind the Frame) is great and 100% worth the four hours of content I just consumed. 

Hope you enjoyed this post. What were you excited about after watching the Summer Game Fest 2021? Also, did you laugh at any of Geoff’s jokes? Let me know! Again, I personally haven’t really watched any of these game shows so this was a new experience for me… Maybe I’ll even watch the E3! We’ll see. :)

Cheers!

This post was first published on Indiecator by Dan Indiecator aka MagiWasTaken. If you like what you see here and want to see more, you can check me out on Twitch and YouTube as well.