Category: Rock, Paper, Shotgun

Animal Well’s solo developer and publisher Bigmode about creating their eerie subterranean world. We then had a chance to go hands on with the PAX East demo, and wow, we were both incredibly impressed. Watch the video below for our enthusiastic impressions:

If we could give an RPS ‘Bestest Best in show’ award to a game, is would be Animal Well. Liam and I loved the game’s dense atmosphere, spider-web of interconnected caverns, and creepy creatures that lurk in the dark. We also loves the effects the game has, which reminded Liam of Octopath Traveler’s visual flairs. If I had to compare it to one game, it would be Hollow Knight, which is very exciting.

We have plenty more PAX East indies for you to check out so make sure you have a peruse through our RPS@PAX tag. A couple of our favourites have been chaotic rouguelite Pizza Possum, Resident Evil-like Alone In The Dark, and island exploration game Mythwrecked.

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WrestleQuest last year at PAX West, and this time at PAX East we finally cornered them in the ring for a proper interview.

Watch below to learn about how the developers created their zero to hero story, how they’re addressing myths and persaonl issues in the world of pro wresting, as well as sharing a story about how one of the team got their nose broken in a wrestling accident during development.

My main take away from the interview is how much of the RPG incorporates all aspects of Wrestling, not just the ring fights we see on TV. Another interesting thing is that Mega Cat reached out to a handful of real-life wrestlers to ask their permission to use their likeness in the game – not an easy feat to secure, I’m sure.

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PAX East, but none left my head reeling as much as 43 Studios’ fiendishly frantic action platfotmer Hell Of An Office. It’s a super fast parkour adventure in the vein of Neon White, and after ten minutes with the demo my heart race was through the roof. If I owned a fitbit it would have been screaming at me to have a nice sit down with a cuppa. Check out my full impressions in the video below:

Hell Of An Office puts your platforming reflexes to the test as you’re tasked with sprinting ad jumping your way straight outta hell. With only a stapler as your means of survival, you need to navigate through each level before it slowly sinks into the burning lava. React quickly, or fall victim to Hell’s scorching pools.

If you love the blood-pumping, sweaty palm inducing action-platforming of Neon White, make sure to keep an eye on Hell Of An Office as it makes it’s way through Early Access.

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Have A Nice Death‘s dark art and quick-slashing combat bring Hollow Knight to mind, but it has more in common with Hades and Dead Cells. One of the things it has in common with those games is that it was released in early access. After a little more than a year, version 1.0 arrived this week, bringing a final area, a new boss, and the end of its storyline.

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Honkai: Star Rail has been hinting at an April 26th release date for months, but now it’s official. The free-to-play, turn-based Genshin Impact spin-off will be available for pre-download from April 23rd and will be available via its official site and the Epic Games Store come the 26th. A presentation streamed yesterday also revealed its first two banners.

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Roki when it first released back in 2020, and keen to see what developers Polygon Treehouse have gotten up to since, I jumped at the opportunity to play the PAX East demo for Mythwrecked: Ambrosia Island. You can watch my impressions of the demo in the video below:

In Mythwrecked you play as Alex, a backpacker who has washed up on the sun-drenched shores of Ambrosia Island. As she begins exploring, she soon realises that this island seems to be a hot spot for the gods from ancient Greek myths. Your task is to befriend each god, help them restore their memories, and find a way back to civilisation.

From playing the demo, you can see much of what made Roki fun reflected in Mythwrecked. The environments are interesting to poke around in, puzzles are breezy brain ticklers, and it has Polygon Treehouse’s sense of humour. Each Greek god has a humerous twist on their lore, and during the demo I had a fun time chatting with Hermes, who is dressed in nothing more than a pair of skimpy white speedos and a matching white sweat band – a bold choice of attire.

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PAX East game highlight straight from the show floor, and this time we decided to revisit a cult horror classic: Alone In The Dark. This psychological horror is being developed by Pieces Interactive with publishing backing from THQ Nordic and is a love letter to the original game released back in the 90s.

As someone who had played the original, and RPS’ Resident Evil uber fan, Liam decided to check out the demo and you can hear his impressions in the video below:

According to the devs at the THQ booth, this demo is a stand-alone prequel story that will not be in the final game, but shares the same eerie atmosphere and action that’ll be in the main game. This reimagining is set in the Gothic American south and in the main game you’ll be playing as Edward Carnby or Emily Hartwood as they navigate the monster infested Derceto Manor, the same mansion featured in the demo.

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PAX East. There’s a lot of cool booths, fun props, and generally weird stuff to see, so we’ve chosen our absolute favourites and have listed them in video form for your viewing pleasure.

Everything at PAX East is situated in one massive hall (instead of PAX West’s multiple floors, rooms, and buildings) so it’s nice and easy to see everything in one or two loops. It doesn’t feel cramped at all, even with Friday’s busy crowds, and the booths are as spectacular as ever.

Some of our favourites included Devolver Digital’s movie theatre-inspired booth, which has the new addition of a candle-lit shrine for Cult Of The Lamb‘s upcoming free expansion Relics Of The Old Faith. We also loved Ysbryd Games’ Demonschool booth which had a school desk layout and cool retro TV. Another favourite was the animated robot dinosaur (complete with rideable saddle) that we found at the Roots Of Pacha demo builds.

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Realtime Nordic, a studio that makes, specifically, video game trailers. “…and we haven’t actually shot anything, so you’ll need to do that yourself. Some of the actors won’t come out of their trailers. One of them will but if you shoot him from the front you realise he’s got no eyes, but don’t show the audience that. It’s not intentional, he’s getting them fixed. Also can you film it twice, for different streaming platforms? Make a really good version for Netflix and a slightly worse looking one for Quibi.”

Every so often a game trailer comes along that makes me think, hang on, that was bloody brilliant! I bet some people made that! Most recently it was Creative Assembly’s Immortal Empires trailer. Well, I’ve been digging around and I’m happy to report that yes, although I’m the first one to just see a trailer as an algorithm trying to snatch my coin purse away like a manure-encrusted Victorian ne’er-do-well, game trailers are made by humans. They’re often humans who do it as as specific job, either in-house at a developer or as an outside agency like Realtime Nordic. Enlightened and enthralled, I asked some of them about what went into the strange space that is making the trailers for your favourite games.

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