Best Games this Spring

As the year marches on and the air grows warmer, and more full of pollen, many find themselves looking for entertainment indoors. Video games have always been a successful escape from reality, and this spring as well as the following year promises bountiful new releases. Owners of the Nintendo Switch will have an especially fruitful season, with many new ports and re-releases increasing the system’s third-party library immensely.

Many new games have already been released this year to major success. In January, highly anticipated sequel Hitman 3 released on all consoles, to favourable reviews^[1]. Alongside it was another long-awaited release, Scott Pilgrim vs The World: The Game. Though an unassuming title, this game has a complicated and infamous development and post-release history that gave this new version increased notoriety. The game, first released a decade ago in 2010, was taken down or ‘delisted’ from all markets in 2014, making it entirely unavailable to any new players. This rerelease marks the first time new players have been able to experience the beat-em-up in more than 6 years.

This somewhat slow start to the year began to end with February, which brought a large number of new titles. Persona 5 Strikers, a new game in the popular Persona franchise, released on Switch, PS4, and PC to good reviews. Much hyped horror indie title Little Nightmares Two released on all major platforms to overwhelmingly positive reactions, in particular praising the game’s effective atmosphere and sound design. On Nintendo consoles, Super Mario 3D World received a re-release along with the experimental Bowser’s Fury addition. This title received praise for its inventive new elements, as well as scorn for its price. The game is yet another older title ported to Switch at full price, something that frustrates more and more consumers.

March had a few releases, including surprise PC hit Loop Hero, which features an interesting card-based gameplay system that has received praise for its unique and well-executed premise. A much more sour launch was found in Balan Wonderworld, which received immediate negative reviews for its one-note gameplay, poor graphical performance, and problematic scenes. The game gained some traction when it was first revealed, but various demos and trailers revealed the wonderworld to be more of a nightmare. This controversy grew after the game began receiving thousands of fake reviews intended to inflate its score^[2].

The highlight of March’s releases, in my opinion, was the highly anticipated Monster Hunter Rise. Currently exclusive to Switch, the game is planned to release on PC before the end of 2021. Rise is the franchise’s first venture onto portable consoles since Monster Hunter Generations Ultimate in 2017, and features many new gameplay features along with refined graphics. The game’s controls, art, and monsters are all improved upon from previous generations, and serves as a powerful addition to any video game library.

Looking into the future, 2021 seems bright for most areas as the many delayed works of 2020 begin to finally arrive. Some more games with currently confirmed release dates in 2021 include Subnautica: Below Zero, the sequel to 2014’s underwater horror success; Disgaea 6, the continuation of a profitable and extremely strange series, and Monster Hunter Stories 2, a Pokemon-style spin off of the original series. Kena: Bridge of Spirits is a game that’s received lots of focus since it was announced, and is planned to release in August; many believe it could be an important new release in the action-adventure genre. Another action game coming out this year is No More Heroes 3, following the 2010 No More Heroes 2.

One game that has received a confounding amount of attention for its seemingly niche appeal is Resident Evil Village. Resident Evil has been a long-running and prosperous series, and Village seems to continue the trend. Horror games are not known for mass appeal, however, so the overwhelming press that the game is receiving is enigmatic. This could be explained by the large fanbase of the franchise as a whole, as well as the game’s refined gameplay and character designs.

A major flaw in the fifth generation consoles, the Xbox X/S and PS5, is their lack of original titles. Most of their library at the moment is made up of games shared with the previous generation of consoles, meaning that few releases are making use of the full graphical fidelity available on the new technology. This is soon to be mended, however, with many of the frontline titles for Sony and Microsoft set to release at an unknown point in 2021. The long-delayed Halo Infinite is hopefully coming out this year, which would provide a much-needed boost to the Xbox X/S’s game selection. The PS5 is also receiving a new God Of War game, which may bring forward some of the widespread popularity of the series’ previous title.

Finally, there are some more nebulous and long-awaited titles that some think may come out this year. One of these is Hollow Knight: Silksong, the mysterious and much-theorized followup to the genre-defining 2017 game. This sequel will follow Hornet, an important character from the first game. The game’s release date has changed multiple times from different sources, but the developers have never actually given a concrete date, so 2021 is only a theory. Another even hazier production is From Software’s Elden Ring, a type of successor to their popular Dark Souls franchise. Almost nothing is known about the development, but it still has a large following due to the director and development company’s previous success. The game has not been announced to release in 2021, but many still believe it may with little evidence.

In general, 2021 is proving to be a year of recovery for the industry, promising various exciting new titles along with the revival of games lost to 2020’s woes. Remakes, re releases, and new versions of old games abound, with many coming to platforms previously untouched. Whether you see this year as a brilliant new frontier or a tired trot through old material, the future promises plenty of entertainment for anyone who is a fan of video games.