Format PC, PS4
Origin US
Release 2021
Max Ponoroff might have the elevator pitch of the year. Starstruck’s director calls it ‘an adventure game where you can save the world through music and destroy it with a giant human hand’. You’re a spaceship captain who’s travelled back in time to 20XX to avert an apocalypse. An apocalypse that somehow involves Edwin, a boy who has aspirations of being a guitarist, and his friend Dawn, who has to deal with her cop mother arresting her during her gigs.
It’s a wonderfully nutty premise, but at first exploring Edwin’s town actually feels comfortingly familiar. Mother 3 is mentioned as an influence, clear from the sedate setting and charmingly odd humour. But Mother never had this gorgeous arts-and-crafts artstyle, one which should have The Origami King worried for its crown.
This story is from the January 2021 edition of Edge.
Start your 7-day Magzter GOLD free trial to access thousands of curated premium stories, and 8,500+ magazines and newspapers.
Already a subscriber ? Sign In
This story is from the January 2021 edition of Edge.
Start your 7-day Magzter GOLD free trial to access thousands of curated premium stories, and 8,500+ magazines and newspapers.
Already a subscriber? Sign In
Bulwark: Falconeer Chronicles
Anyone familiar with the concept of kitbashing is already halfway to understanding what Tomas Sala’s open-world builder is all about.
Children Of The Sun
René Rother’s acrid revenge thriller – an action game with its limbs broken and forcibly rearranged into the shape of a spatial puzzler – is at once a bonafide original and an unlikely throwback. Cast your eyes right and you wouldn’t blink if we told you this was a forgotten Grasshopper Manufacture game from the early PS3 era (we won’t be at all surprised if this finds a spot on Suda51’s end-of-year list).
Post Script
What does Rise Of The Ronin say for PS5 exclusivity?
Rise Of The Ronin
Falling in battle simply switches control to the next person up, and then quick revive fixes everything
Post Script
The pawn and the pandemic
Dragon's Dogma 2
The road from Vernworth to Bakbattahl is scenic but arduous. Ignore the dawdling mobs of goblins, and duck beneath the chanting harpies that circle on the currents overhead, and even moving at a hurried clip it is impossible for a party of four to complete the journey by nightfall.
BLUE MANCHU
How enforced early retirement eventually led Jonathan Chey back to System Shock
THE MAKING 0F.... AMERICAN ARCADIA
How a contrast of perspectives added extra layers to a side-scrolling platform game
COMING IN TO LAND
The creator of Spelunky, plus a super-group of indie developers, have spent the best part of a decade making 50 games. Has the journey been worth it?
VOID SOLS
This abstract indie Soulslike has some bright ideas
