MAY SHOWERS BRING FREE GAMES
The month of May is upon us. Summer is just around the corner. The trees are turning green again and the snow has melted. While the rest of the world leaves the safety of their houses to experience sunshine, gamers have other priorities: the free games we get each month from PlayStation and Xbox. This month is another good one, with plenty of unique titles that you may have been sleeping on. But the question remains, which console offers bigger savings? Well, let’s find out.
PLAYSTATION INSTANT GAMES COLLECTION
Here are the standard prices of this month’s PlayStation free games:
PS4
- Tales from the Borderlands – $35
- Abzu – $19.99
PS3
- Blood Knights – $9.99
- Port Royale 3: Pirates and Merchants – $19.99
PS Vita
- Laser Disco Defenders (Cross Buy with PS4) – $9.99
- Type:Rider (Cross Buy on PS4) – $7.99
Sony’s offerings for May include some rather obscure but still great picks nonetheless. On PS4, you can download Tales from the Borderlands. It’s an episodic adventure game from Telltale Games set in the whacky and humorous Borderlands universe. It highlights the wit and hilarity of those games since there is almost no shooting. It follows the Telltale style of adventure game and has more action, which makes it perfect for those who don’t have a great deal of experience with the genre.
PS4 players can also experience Abzu. Upon release, many called it Journey underwater, but it’s much more than that. Swimming through the game’s gorgeous environments and interacting with the sea life is relaxing and evocative throughout its duration. The story is simple and told completely through the environment. It’s a beautiful, stunning title that should absolutely be experienced.
Those with their PS3 still hooked up can hack and slash their way through Blood Knights. The camera sits just above your character as you tear into all sorts of demons and ghouls, unleashing abilities and collecting devastating new gear. It looks like a fun fantasy romp, especially on a console with very few new releases these days.
Port Royale 3 is a pirate-centric strategy game for PS3. A controller isn’t the best way to play a game like this, but it works just fine. You’ll do a lot of resource management and go to war against armadas of enemy ships. The deep systems and armies you can build up make working your way through its campaign fun and fulfilling.
As always, the two free PS Vita games can also be played on PS4 through Cross Buy. Laser Disco Defenders is a groovy 2D platformer. You float through levels, firing at explosives to clear a path to the goal. The catch is that your lasers bounce off surfaces, so the more you shoot, the more difficult it is for you to maneuver.
The final game for this month is Type: Rider. You play as a colon collecting other punctuations in a world inhabited by letters and grammar. It uses these mechanics to great effect, helping to differentiate it from other platformers.
A PlayStation Plus subscription can net you $103 of savings during the month of May. Every game has something different to offer, not just free gameplay. Regardless, that’s a lot of free games.
XBOX GAMES WITH GOLD
Here are the standard prices for this month’s lineup of Xbox games:
Xbox One
- Giana Sisters: Twisted Dreams – $19.99
- Lara Croft and the Temple of Osiris – $19.99
Xbox 360
- Star Wars: The Force Unleashed II – $19.99
- LEGO Star Wars: The Complete Saga – $19.99
The two free games that Microsoft is giving Xbox One players in May are both completely different but equally fun. Giana Sisters is a fun platformer with a neat hook. Giana can inhabit two worlds – a bright colorful one filled with flowers and rainbows, and a dark, decaying one. The trick is that you have to rapidly switch between the two to complete each level.
Lara Croft and the Temple of Osiris, on the other hand, is a top-down shooter. There are puzzles to solves, chasms to leap across, and plenty of undead enemies to shoot in the face. Both games are incredibly well made and offer up unique challenges.
In honor of May 4th, this month’s Xbox 360 games are both Star Wars. The Force Unleashed II is the dramatic continuation of Star Killer’s story, but this time he has two lightsabers. You’ll hack apart Stormtroopers, use the force to toss enemies around, and cut your way through the empire. The other Star Wars game available is less violent. The LEGO Star Wars complete saga is exactly what it sounds like. You play through every Star Wars movie in brick form, building weapons, speeding through trenches, collecting characters, and finding all of the gold bricks.
The fine folks over at Microsoft are saving Xbox Live Gold subscribers $80 this month. Yes, they still have to pay $60 a year for the subscription but this makes that money back in a month and you can play a slew of fun titles instead.
BANG FOR YOUR BUCK
Who came out on top this month? Well, that would be Sony. The PlayStation creator offers $103 of savings while Microsoft offers only $80. May has a lot of fantastic titles coming out but if none of them appeal to you, you can rest easy knowing that there are still plenty of games you can play through while you wait for your next anticipated game.
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