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myEarlier this week, the Culture Department asked me to recommend four games for our annual fall art preview. Reader: I struggled. The period between September and November is typically packed with AAA releases, as publishers vie for space in the historically lucrative run-up to Christmas. Even in this era of “live service” games like Fortnite, Destiny, and Genshin Impact (which ignore external sales patterns in favor of their own, constantly updating season passes), an autumn burp of major game releases is usually guaranteed.
But this year… not so much. September is mostly focused on The Legend of Zelda: Echoes of Wisdom (below). October is the Silent Hill 2 reboot, Call of Duty: Black Ops 6, and at most, Sonic X Shadow Generations. We have to wait until November for a truly busy blockbuster schedule with Slitterhead, Football Manager 2025, Assassin’s Creed Shadows, and Stalker 2: Heart of Chernobyl all lining up for our winter delight. The long-awaited RPG Avowed has been delayed until 2025, while Indiana Jones and the Great Circle has yet to receive a release date beyond “2024,” which doesn’t sound promising.
Why? There are a few possible explanations. 2023 was a busy year, overloaded with big releases like Baldur’s Gate 3, Marvel’s Spider-Man 2, Alan Wake 2, The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom, Starfield, and Diablo IV. Meanwhile, 2025 is already looking very busy, with GTA 6, Death Stranding 2, Monster Hunter Wilds, and Civilization 7 all showing their might. And the burst of development activity that took place during COVID-19 is now waning, as we’re seeing from the embarrassing number of layoffs and studio closures across the industry. Perhaps a fallow year was to be expected.
The good news is that the reduction in attention-hogging megatitles means smaller games will have a chance to grab an audience. September has some genuinely interesting original and indie titles, such as the bizarre adventures Phoenix Springs (pictured above) and Demonschool, the fascinating retro collection UFO 50 and the Atari-era throwback Yars Rising. My son Zac is desperate to play October’s Dragon Ball: Sparking! Zero, while as a long-time fan of Konami comics, cartoons and 90s arcade games, I’ll be enjoying TMNT: Mutants Unleashed. Life is Strange: Double Exposure should also benefit from the extra space it’ll have for its time-bending murder mystery.
It can be comforting to have dozens of massive video game franchises released in the space of twelve weeks that will last for years. Like summer blockbuster movies, they set the structure of our years; they tell us where we were and what we were doing at key moments in our lives. In a world where old certainties are crumbling, the rituals of entertainment provide stability and shared expectations. We may never again see people lining up to see the latest Star Wars movie, or queuing at midnight outside video game or electronics stores to buy Call of Duty: Modern Warfare, but those shows of consumer enthusiasm really meant something.
And yet, quieter years offer us other options. You have time and space to let go of the usual purchases. It’s often said that 2014 was a “bad” year for video games due to the lack of big releases. But it was also the year of Alien: Isolation, Titanfall, and Shovel Knight. It was the year I put hundreds of hours into Middle-earth: Shadow of Mordor despite not being a Lord of the Rings fan at all. It was the year of OlliOlli, The Evil Within, and The Vanishing of Ethan Carter. These are games I might not have had the chance to play properly if they hadn’t been given the space. I’m very glad I did.
Anyway, I managed to select four games for the fall art show, and when I started thinking about it more broadly, a bunch of others came up with them. So take advantage of the approaching fall to try something new, something original, something you can share and recommend. Those games will get you through fall and winter just as well, and you’ll have your own stories to tell at the end.
What to play
With no dedicated Olympic Games this year, it’s worth a revisit. Nintendo Switch Sportsespecially since a new update has added basketball to the roster. You can play solo or against friends (both online and locally), shaking the Joy-Con to dribble and flicking your wrist to shoot. There are also mini-games to test your dunking skills. The collection includes five other Olympic events, so you can easily organize your own slightly chaotic sports tournament.
Available in: Nintendo Switch
Approximate playing time: As much as you like
What to read
Independent studio Innersloth achieved unexpected success with its traitor Among us game during lockdown. Now the company is using that money to Funding small developers with innovative ideas – a touching story.
There are new rumors of a new Half life gameReferences were made to a Valve development codenamed ‘Project White Sands’. found in online portfolio of video game actress Natasha Chandel. The mention has since been removed from the site, but that’s not going to stop the rumors.
I love highly specific. Deep Dives into Video Gamesand Polygon is a great source. The site’s latest addition is a List of all banned and unaired episodes of the Pokémon animated serieswith full explanations. It’s a wild ride.
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Block of questions
This week’s query came from user X Chambers of Danwho asks:
“Can the Switch 2, or whatever it ends up being called, live up to the Switch, or is it doomed to comparable failure? And what are some of the key foundations for its success?”
Little is known about Nintendo’s next console other than the fact that it will be released before the end of March 2025, and that rumored specs It packs an eight-core Cortex-A78AE processor, 8GB of RAM and 64GB of internal storage. That’s fine, but not very exciting, and no one looks to Nintendo consoles for technical power.
With the exception of the SNES, the company has always had better results at radically updating the form factors of its machines (from the SNES to the N64, the GameCube to the Wii), while it has had a harder time (comparatively speaking) at making more technology-driven updates (i.e. the GameCube (loved by some, but a sales disappointment) and the Wii U). The Switch 2, for the moment, seems to fall into the latter category; we’re not hearing about any crazy new ideas in terms of interface or interaction.
What’s needed is an innovative, highly visual and easy-to-understand concept, something that can be easily shown in a few seconds of footage from a new Super Mario game. Maybe there’s some new feature on the built-in screen, or some local multiplayer concept we haven’t seen before. The design philosophy of Nintendo’s great tech wizard Gunpei Yokoi still holds true: lateral thinking with fading technologies. A big OLED screen just won’t cut it.
If you have any questions for Question Block, or anything else to say about the newsletter, Email us at pushingbuttons@theguardian.com.