Sea of Thieves
Sea of Thieves will be Xbox One’s first big splash of 2018. Several games, such as The Legend of Zelda: The Wind Waker, and Assassin’s Creed IV: Black Flag, captured the liberating feeling of sailing the ocean in search of treasure. Sea of Thieves takes these concepts and expands on them by putting players into a situation where they have to work together. No longer can they sail, fight, and plunder all on their own. Sea of Thieves is all about teamwork in every aspect of its design.
Each crew member is entrusted to fulfill a specific function. Steering the ship, raising the anchor, on the lookout for enemies; success requires a frenzy of purposeful movement, but it almost always involves laughing uncontrollably, too, as you try and coordinate your adventure. Sea of Thieves plays on the premise of the goofy pirate game with its over the top animations, and fun gameplay mechanics, such as using cannons to quickly launch from your ship to a nearby island. But beyond all the silliness, there’s intense survival gameplay that demands careful strategy, too.
Perhaps the biggest concern is just how much the game does rely on communication. Sea of Thieves requires a mic, for starters, and a reliable group of buddies to properly take advantage of its design. What’s more, we’re yet to see what the gameplay loop is beyond the initial entertainment of piloting a ship and running a few island quests. So is there enough gameplay here to keep players entertained in the long term? We love the idea of Sea of Thieves, but let’s just hope it’s appeal is a lasting one.
Ori and the Will of the Wisps
Ori and the Blind Forest, a 2D Metroidvania that released for Xbox One and Windows in 2015, was met with positive reviews for its level design and surprisingly emotional story. No doubt its sequel, the upcoming Ori and the Will of the Wisps, will build on its predecessor’s success.
There aren’t too many details as of yet as to the game’s story or what new abilities the game will implement. All we know so far is that the Ori and the Will of the Wisps will take Ori beyond the forest of the first game in order to discover their true destiny. If it’s anything like its predecessor, Ori and the Will of the Wisps will capture the hearts and minds of players with its cute characters, dark themes, and tough (yet fair) gameplay.
The Last Night
Another Xbox One and PC game that players don’t know too much about, The Last Night is an indie 2.5D cinematic platformer that captured the hearts of many cyberpunk fans with its gorgeous E3 2017 reveal.
In The Last Night, players take control of Charlie, a young man who lives in a futuristic dystopian society. Here, civilians live in comfort because machines bare the brunt of manual labor. Details on the game are fairly scant but from what we know so far, the design allows for plenty of exploration around its beautiful, ambient urban setting With regards to gameplay, it seems to involve elements of combat, as trailers have revealed moments of Charlie getting into gunfights or sneaking through throngs of armed guards.
Not too many games still allow players to actually explore the cyberpunk genre. That’s why The Last Night is so enticing. It’s the promise of, in a manner similar to the recent Deus Ex titles, getting to see many parts of a cyberpunk world, as opposed to one piece. Recent cyberpunk titles have teased players with dystopian backdrops ripe with lore and well-written characters, but few opportunities to actually get out and experience these aspects of the world first-hand. The Last Night seems to offer a welcome change of pace.
It’s also incredible to see what they’ve managed to make with pixelated sprites. The retro-looking style is perfect for a cyberpunk title. Much how cyberpunk is a futuristic interpretation of old technology, The Last Night’s pixel graphics are a shiny variation of the gaming sprites from this industry’s inception.
Pit People
This Xbox One and PC title is from the same team that brought players Alien Hominid, Castle Crashers, and Battleblock Theater. Pit People remained in Early Access through most of 2017, but in 2018 it’s officially releasing. The Behemoth’s insane humor and cartoonish art style return to tell another wacky story.
Pit People continues where Battleblock Theater left off: a massive beam of energy launching from Hatty Hattington’s hat into outer space and shooting down a bear. The player quickly learns that the bear fell to earth and shatter the world’s surface. This causes the worlds of The Behemoth’s previous three games, as well as a few previously unseen worlds, to all come colliding together. Players have already seen many familiar faces return in the Early Access version of the game. Most notably, the narrator of Battleblock Theater (once again voiced by Stamper, the man who helped make both Castle Crashers and Battleblock Theater as popular as they are) returns, this time as the hilarious antagonist.
Gameplay wise, Pit People is an action role-playing strategy game. Players can capture the monsters and enemies they encounter in the world to build a team of fighters. Each fighter fits into a specific class, moves across the battlefield in different ways, and possesses unique personalities and abilities. The game does allow for co-op play for any players who want to tackle the adventure with a friend, and has an online battle mode for those who want to test their skills against human opponents. The Behemoth has made a name for itself as a developer, and the Early Access of Pit People has proven they haven’t lost their touch. The full version of this game should be releasing in early 2018.
The Darwin Project
The Darwin Project takes both PUBG’s formula and Fortnite/Paladin’s cel-shaded art style, and throws in some of the crafting and survivability aspects of a game like Don’t Starve. The game also features a heavy emphasis on tracking and audience interaction; more Hunger Games than Battle Royale.
Gameplay of The Darwin Project has shown players using numerous tactics to track their competition, like following footprints in the snow. Heat signatures seem to play the most interesting role. The characters give off minimalistic body heat, but campfires (which are necessary to stave off hypothermia) give off a lot more heat, and are thus easier to track. If a player has found a means to track heat signatures, and they notice a large one pop up, it’s probably a player trying to warm up. Of course, a campfire could also be used as a trap. Clever hunters can use valuable resources and time to construct a fire, only to hide nearby and wait to ambush any other players looking to score an easy kill.
More interestingly, dev blogs and trailers market The Darwin Project as an upcoming eSport. Whether the game has what it takes to compete with games like Overwatch or League of Legends remains to be seen, but The Darwin Project does show promise of adding some much needed variety to the battle royale formula instead of just copying PUBG.
Crackdown 3
Originally scheduled to launch in Q4 2017 to help herald in the Xbox One X, Crackdown 3 was delayed until spring of 2018. The game had an impressive showing at E3 2017, but needed some final bugs to be worked out. That’s fine by us. 2017’s loss is 2018’s gain.
Both Crackdown and Crackdown 2 proved popular with players, and Crackdown 3 aims to bring the same level of cooperative mayhem. Fans of the franchise will be familiar with Crackdown 3’s gameplay as the newest game gives players another impressively sized sandbox to rampage in and destroy. Not every trailer for Crackdown 3 has been popularly received (some felt the over-the-top Terry Crews trailer to be pretty cringe-worthy), but Crackdown 3 isn’t really a game that needs solid advertising. This franchise has a solid community of players, and they’re tired of playing “tame” titles like Just Cause 3 and Agents of Mayhem.
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