This Week in Games

Summer Games Fest 2025

Welcome back, folks! With Summer Games Fest behind us, and we have another little bundle of news to share. How nice. It ought to take my mind off of not having a Switch 2 yet...

Splatoon has done pretty well as the original game hits 10 years old. The series has become a central pillar for Nintendo. While Splatoon thrived with the Miiverse platform (RIP), it's done pretty well on the Switch—enough for Nintendo to keep pumping out Splatoon goodies. Not bad for the little squid-kids. This past week also saw quite a bit of Splatoon news; it's not quite an anniversary celebration, but it's pretty big nevertheless...

Chief among the news was the reveal of the first-ever Splatoon spin-off: Splatoon Raiders. All three of the mainline Splatoon games thus far have been multiplayer live-service titles; this game has the looks of a single-player title. The story involves the singers Deep Cut (Shiver, Frye, and Big Man) ending up on the mysterious Spiralite Island, where a curious storm is taking place. You don't play as Deep Cut, you play as an ordinary Inkling, described as "a mechanic." I get the feeling this might be an exploration game with crafting. Precious little else was announced regarding Splatoon Raiders.

The biggest news besides was that Splatoon Raiders was originally revealed through Nintendo's official app, with YouTube getting the reveal some time later. Nintendo is committed to handling most of their stuff through their own platforms... though I think they've been vindicated on this one. Nintendo pioneered breaking away from E3 to handle their own game reveals, and their Nintendo Directs are now the industry standard for all major publishers. (People are currently reading tea leaves trying to predict when the June Direct will land.) With Twitter having burned all of the publishers but hard, I don't blame Nintendo for finding new ways to get their news "directly to you."

The rest of the news is fairly mundane stuff for Splatoon: increased Freshness ranks for weapons, new badges, the return of Splatoon 1's Urchin Underpass as a stage, and a new set of 30 weapons. Fans can also look forward to Splatoon 3 being optimized on the Switch 2, a much-needed upgrade. I'll keep you posted on any further Splatoon Raiders news.

Let's talk Street Fighter 6! It stands to reason that a series as storied as Street Fighter has a ton of characters people love. CAPCOM announced their new wave of DLC characters over the weekend, and we have a winner on our hands—not just because all of the DLC characters are returning fan-favorites (imagine if we got four Elenas returning to the roster), but also because CAPCOM handled the best way they could: by roping in AEW wrestler and CAPCOM fan Kenny Omega to cosplay the characters for them. Yes, including the female characters.

Bless this beautiful, beautiful man. Alex is back. First seen in Street Fighter III: New Generation, Alex is from Manhattan. His moveset combines kickboxing and wrestling. We last saw him in Street Fighter V. I don't have too much to say about him.

C. Viper (the "C" stands for "Crimson") is a major blast from the past; one of the new characters from Street Fighter IV (she premiered before Juri did!), C. Viper is a CIA agent—and a single mom in her 30s. She weaves gadgets into her fighting style (think Kiryu's "Agent"-style from Like A Dragon: The Man Who Erased His Name). I am wild over her redesign. I'm such a sucker for the flowing hair and the coat draped like a cape over her shoulders.

Ingrid is a bit weirder. She's a deep cut, for sure, and not an unwelcome one. But her place in Street Fighter lore is kinda... weird? Originally planned for the cancelled CAPCOM Fighting All-Stars, where she was intended to be one of the "Code Holders" (figures who held codes for a bomb in the city), she instead debuted in CAPCOM Fighting Evolution. According to Street Fighter Alpha 3 MAX, she's somehow connected to M. Bison's Psycho power. The lore has been inconsistent with this, with some sources claiming she's the original source of Psycho Power (which Bison usurped from her; apparently, he named it "Psycho Power") or that her power is some other mysterious force. Also, Street Fighter: The Legend of Chun Li claimed that Ingrid was Bison's daughter and that he poured all of his goodness into her so he could be unmitigatedly evil and... be a realty baron? That was a weird movie. At any rate, Ingrid is finally back, after her status as an official Street Fighter character being in contention for ages, even within CAPCOM. Ingrid hasn't been seen for a bit, only "appearing" as an outfit for Karin in Street Fighter V; I look forward to her new playstyle. Also, her new hair buns are cute.

The new line-up is rounded out by Sagat, who I'm stunned wasn't in Street Fighter VI by default! Sagat is really important in the games! Originally serving as the final boss for the original Street Fighter, Sagat had a complete arc throughout the series. Canonically, Ryu defeated Sagat with a Shoryuken (which he used after going berserk, hinting at the evil powers that lay behind the Satsui no Hado). Sagat would later be revealed as one of M. Bison's trusted generals within Shadaloo, consumed by a desire for revenge against Ryu. Also, he killed one of Dhalsim's elephants with a single punch. After meeting Dan Hibiki, who holds a vendetta against Sagat after Sagat killed his father, Sagat realizes the error of his ways and lets go of his desire for revenge. It's a sweet story.

Anyway, Sagat is famously a Muay Thai practitioner. His moveset is something of an evil take on Ryu's; his Tiger Shot and Tiger Uppercut mirror Ryu's Hadouken and Shoryuken, only the Tiger Shot can be fired high or low, and the Tiger Uppercut works a bit better as a counter to the Shoryuken (it's not as safe on start-up). I dig Sagat a ton, both as an antagonist to Ryu and as a depiction of Muay Thai. I'm not a Muay Thai practitioner, but after a column I did as a fresh-faced 23-year-old in college about a local Muay Thai gym, I walked away with a great appreciation for the martial art. (Yes, that's me in the main picture!)

Sagat and C. Viper are planned for launch later this year, with Alex and Ingrid due out in 2026. Get excited to burn some muscle with them!

Folks are all enjoying Mario Kart World, particularly due to its high volume of Cow™ (100% more playable Cow than the other leading brands!). With that said, I like the Sonic Racing titles! They might live in Mario Kart's shadow, but I swear by Sonic & All-Stars Racing Transformed. The mechanics are fun, the stages are brilliant, and the music is great. I'm happy to see Sonic Racing. Especially since Sega announced some fun cameo characters! Mario Kart may now have Cow™, but...

... Sonic has Hatsune Miku! She's even got a cute little racing outfit! Sega and Miku have a ton of history, with Sega having published a ton of Miku games over the years—specifically the Project Diva titles, which themselves have a ton of songs based on Sega games. This may well be the first time Miku and Sonic interact in a game. Also appearing is Ichiban Kasuga of the Like A Dragon series. He's having lots of fun, bless him. And because Sega owns Atlus, Joker is there too. His Arsène-themed car is cool, at least.

The real surprise is that Steve from Minecraft will also be showing up; the trailer revealed that a Minecraft-themed world will be available as a DLC stage, along with the cubed hero.

Sonic Racing: CrossWorlds releases this September 25th on PS4, PS5, Xbox Series X|S, Switch, Switch 2, Steam, and Epic Store.

After a few weeks full of a lot of "not much," we finally had a ton of news drop on us over the weekend. Provided, it's for a lot of games that are a long way out; I don't think any one of us are lacking for games to play (I'd bet a lot of people still haven't gotten around to checking out Dragon's Dogma 2, anyway). But it's a good chance to look this stuff over!

Persona 4 is officially getting a remake along the lines of last year's Persona 3: Reload with Persona 4: Revival. This was a bit of an open-secret; there had already been some underground buzzing about Atlus having taken out a URL for a related website, and famously the voice cast of the original had announced that they hadn't been approached to reprise their roles a few days before the reveal. A lot of people imagine that the reveal was likely done for the sake of pacifying the rumors before a proper announcement later this month (during a Nintendo Direct, perhaps?). The trailer looks neat; the sleepy, rural town of Inaba looks nice, the protagonist looks nice running around its streets... I'd hate to water down the genuinely superlative style for the games, but it looks about as good as all the other Persona games do. The menus are going to be kinda nuts.

I'm not all that excited for Persona 4: Revival, though. This remake feels a bit like a piss-take. Like... Persona 4: Golden is right over there, as it were, on Steam. It might not look as fancy as current-gen titles, but it's as complete an experience for Persona 4 as anyone would want, even with that god-awful epilogue. At least with Persona 3: Reload, the original title hadn't been seen since its PlayStation 2 release—the closest we had was Persona 3 Portable on Steam. And while Persona 3 Portable features the female protagonist (whom Atlus is very foolish for not incorporating more often—shame, shame), it's also very much not the same game as Persona 3 in a lot of ways.

There's also how Persona 4 got a lot more spin-offs than Persona 3; in addition to the updated Golden re-release, Persona 4 also saw an actual sequel with the Persona 4: Arena games, crossed over with Blaz Blue: Cross Tag Battle, and even had the musical Dancing All Night spin-offs. And that's before we count the Persona Q titles, or the Persona 4 anime. I know a lot of people kvetch about the constant deluge of Persona 5 spin-offs, but Persona 4 was the test run for those. All this to say that Persona 4 is still fairly fresh in our memories; people who are that interested in experiencing the story of kids trying to solve a series of murders set in the alternate television-based dimensions of their rural Japanese town can do so right now.

This wouldn't sting so bad if the shadow of the first three Persona games (Persona: Be Your True Mind, Persona 2: Innocent Sin and Persona 2: Eternal Punishment) weren't constantly looming over the series. Again, Persona 4: Golden was a phenomenal update for Persona 4; not only have we not seen the original 3 Persona games since the PSP, they're in desperate need of a lot of TLC. And seeing how Atlus divvied up Persona 3's content as DLC (even making people have to pay extra for the epilogue, The Answer), I'm not looking forward to whatever kind of shenanigans Atlus might pull with Persona 4: Revival.

So far, Persona 4: Revival has been announced for Xbox Series X|S, PS5, and Steam. No word yet on a Switch 2 release, but the Switch 2 only just released last week; there'd be a thickening plot if it doesn't make its way onto the Switch 2 sooner or later. (Teddie thickens too.)

How about a new Resident Evil? How about a new Resident Evil... based on an old spin-off!? Folks were excited to see Resident Evil Requiem announced over the weekend. Our protagonist, Grace Ashcroft, is an FBI agent tasked with investigating a strange disease—one linked to the smoking crater that used to be Raccoon City... The fanservice in this one is wild, with shots of the now-dilapidated Raccoon City Police Department (the old statue is still there!). More importantly, Grace is the daughter of a former Resident Evil heroine--the journalist Alyssa Ashcroft, best known as one of the survivors from the Resident Evil Outbreak games.

Folks might not remember Outbreak; they were a pair of online-enabled Resident Evil games where up to four players could cooperate and trek through levels set in Raccoon City before its destruction. Each of the eight survivors had different abilities, like varying inventory slots or attack parameters. Outbreak's use of the PS2's online network for its co-op served as the predecessor for things like the co-op features in Resident Evil 5, even if they were hampered by the lack of full voice chat. According to Requiem's trailer, Alyssa has been dead for a few years now, further encouraging Grace to follow in her mother's footsteps and investigate the disease.

I'm amused by the subtitle being "Requiem," because that spells out "REq"... and as anyone who's played 999: Nine Hours, Nine Persons, Nine Doors can tell you, not only does "q" kinda look like the number "9," but they're pronounced the same in Japanese ("kyu"). Hence, Resident Evil Requiem is the official ninth title of the Resident Evil series. Cute! Look forward to this biohazard of a title in 2026 on the PS5, Steam, and Xbox Series X|S.

Let's talk Solo Leveling! Solo Leveling reminds me a bit of Full Metal Panic! in that it's apparently hugely popular, but I never see artists drawing fan art of it. Heck, I've at least seen doujinshi of Full Metal Panic!, I've never seen Solo Leveling doujinshi. At any rate, Solo Leveling is—I'm told—very popular at the moment among the isekai fandom, and as such it's getting a second game, the highly-anticipated Solo Leveling: Arise Overdrive. There's some confusion over whether Arise Overdrive is a separate title from Arise; according to Getchu, developer Netmarble has confirmed it's a standalone title.

The confusion is because Solo Leveling: Arise is a gacha game; players take protagonist Sung Jinwoo into quests to hunt down monsters that come through Challenge Gates, where you can extract their shadows upon defeat to turn them into your minions. There's a lot of hemming and hawing about the action involved, but it's otherwise a pretty standard hack-and-slash affair. Arise doesn't even feature co-op—which is the central feature for Arise Overdrive, it seems. Not helping the confusion is whether or not we'll see the gacha mechanics incorporated into Arise Overdrive or if they'll be handled differently, or if the game will come to other consoles besides the Xbox Series X|S and Steam--or even if the co-op will make its way back to Arise. No word yet on its release date.

One of the bigger surprises from over the weekend was Beast of Reincarnation, which seems to be a Souls-like action game from GAME FREAK. People are agog that GAME FREAK isn't making a game that's exclusive to a Nintendo console, let alone one that looks the way it does. The truth is, Nintendo doesn't own GAME FREAK—never has. It doesn't help that the gaming community at large snubs GAME FREAK's non-Pokémon games like Drill Dozer, HarmoKnight, Pocket Card Jockey or Giga Wrecker. And heck, Pocket Card Jockey and Giga Wrecker are even available on non-Nintendo consoles!

People are also agog that Beast of Reincarnation features detailed, realistic visuals, which is a major shift in aesthetics for GAME FREAK—no sign of Ken Sugimori's signature art style here. This feeds into a lot of fishwrap about how this is evidence that GAME FREAK just decides for Pokémon to "look bad" (people spend so long counting polygons on cliffs that they ignore all of the character designs from artists like Take because "cartoon graphics are for kids"). I think there's a lot of discussion to be had with Pokémon regarding what it takes for a game to be considered "good-looking," or which games are allowed to release in an unfinished state (or be redeemed after it's repaired). And it's unfair to Beast of Reincarnation to be the fulcrum of that argument.

Beast of Reincarnation looks pretty neat. It takes place 2,000 years in the future, after humanity has been driven back into a "Feudal Japan"-style of life due to a mysterious beast spreading a blight across the land. You play as Emma the Sealer, a woman who can defeat the fantastical monsters created by the blight, as well as the leftover robots from mankind's past. I'm not wild about this shaping up to be another Souls-like (remember when you could just make an action-adventure game without stamina meters?). But I do genuinely like the aesthetics. There's a visual trend of characters controlling and summoning flowering vines, including a bit where Emma's ponytail becomes vines; it reminds me of the movie Annihilation, and I genuinely wonder if anyone from GAME FREAK intended for that. Anyway, there's no word yet on a release date for Beast of Reincarnation, outside of a vague "2026" window. It'll be coming out on Xbox Series X|S, PS5, and Steam.

I'm a little fatigued when it comes to rogue-lites—not "rogue-likes," mind (though I wish more rogue-like took on after mystery dungeon games), but rogue-lites. The difference is that rogue-lites tend to be straight-up action games with randomized perks after clearing waves of enemies. I do like that we're getting more games like Hades—but then, that's the thing. This is another game in the style of Hades. It's all on display with Towa and the Guardians of the Sacred Tree, too, from the (admittedly lovely) pre-rendered backgrounds to the angled top-down perspective.

But here's the catch: I love the cast. While the game itself takes on after Hades's aesthetic, the cutscenes lean into a more traditional "anime" art style. And the character design here is what stands out to me: the cast is a mish-mash of fantastical Medieval-Japanese heroes with some non-humanoid peeps tossed in (like a giant Shiba Inu-man, or the giant koi man). The moment I saw this cast, I was reminded of the old Shining Force games and how they'd rope in tons of humans, elves, and anthro characters together (plus other weirdos like Yogurt or Kiwi). And that has me roped in far more than anything else in this game; I immediately want to know more about these guys. So, misgivings about rogue-lites notwithstanding, I'm excited for Towa and the Guardians of the Sacred Tree. Look forward to it this September 15, on PS5, Xbox Series X|S, Switch, and Steam.

Code Vein is getting a sequel! The original Code Vein was one of the first Souls-likes to lean into an anime aesthetic, going for a very "chuuni" vibe compared to Dark Souls' somber high-fantasy mood or Ni-Oh's take on Feudal Japan. But the vibe I get from most is that people liked the character creator a lot more than the game itself; Code Vein gave folks tons of options with regards to their character design (even including stuff like hats or accessories), but I never saw many people who cared as much about the combat. Code Vein's story of soldiers fighting off a vampiric threat was at least a novel take on the Souls-like formula.

With that in mind, I have high hopes for Code Vein 2. They're already halfway there: if they can maintain the phenomenal character creator but also give a better story and maybe tighten the gameplay, I can see Code Vein becoming a big cult hit. The fun of Code Vein is that you can make your own Blorpus McGorpus, only their face won't be hidden behind a fluted helmet for 90% of your playtime (and they won't be disfigured when their Humanity runs out or whatever). Look out for Code Vein 2 in 2026 on PS5, Xbox Series X|S, and Steam.

I'll cop to having a soft spot for The Seven Deadly Sins. I hate Melodias (Elizabeth is too good for him), but God help me, I love Hawk, and I especially love Ban and his backstory. I have fond memories of marathoning the whole series on one nice weekend where I was staying over at my bro's house in Puerto Rico. But it feels a bit weird for there to be a gacha game for this anime this far out; there doesn't seem to be any buzz for The Seven Deadly Sins anymore. And that's on top of this being a gacha game based on an anime. There's potential for those to make a ton of money, I guess, but there's still only so much you can do within the setting of an anime—especially for a gacha game.

Which is where I stand with The Seven Deadly Sins: Origin. It seems to be a Genshin Impact within the Seven Deadly Sins universe. The trailer doesn't inspire much hope; there are a lot of clips from what seem to be story cutscenes, but not a lot of actual gameplay. And I'm willing to bet that's because the game itself is loaded with busywork and grinding. The sad thing is that a Seven Deadly Sins action-RPG would be pretty awesome. There's a lot you could do there. What a shame. There's no concrete date for The Seven Deadly Sins: Origin, outside of a 2025 window. It'll release on PS5, iOS, Android, and Steam.

A lot of these games, you'll notice, don't have Switch 2 release dates. I'm not particularly worried about this; like I said earlier, the console only just released last week (at the time of writing), and from what I understand, not many publishers have acquired devkits yet. It's too soon to take this as any sign. Nothing to do but wait and see.

That'll do it for this week, I think. With the summer having only just begun, I look forward to seeing what else the summer months bring us. The Dog Days are a great time to whittle down your backlog, even if it's just catching up on—oh, hang on, I just got an e-mail, wonder what this is about...

... Oh...