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Our most anticipated RPGs of 2021Horaszdóttir levels up
Horaszdóttir levels up
Flee, gentle reader, for she has come again! It’s not too late for you to escape her: Horaszdóttir the Endless, she of the big boots and bear fur. Alas, our fate is sealed. She visits us every winter to split open turkeys from her eldritch flock, and soothsay our most anticipated game releases for the year to come.
She shows us many a game in those birds, reader, and we must impart the dread knowledge to you. We’ve already donestrategy games; what hideous vision of the future is forced on us today? Ah yes, of course. It is the time of the storytellers, the quests and levelling, the congress with aliens. RPGs!
Gamedec
Gamedec Demo - Interrogating Timmy The Tiny PervWatch on YouTube
Gamedec Demo - Interrogating Timmy The Tiny Perv
BioMutant
Katharine:I’ve been looking forward to BioMutant ever since I first saw it at Gamescom in 2017. That seems like an actual eon ago now, and it’s clear from Experiment 101’s recent announcements (the first peep we’ve heard from them in three years) that the game itself has changed quite a lot since then, too - which is apt given the mutating animal characters sitting at its core. From the looks of things, though, what I loved most about those early demos still seems to be very much present and correct, and I’m crossing all fingers and toes that its ballooning script hasn’t given its story a case of the old mega bloat.
Mount & Blade II: Bannerlord
Alice0:I’ve not touched M&B2 during early access because after seeing the original go through several revisions before finding its best form, I’m glad to see this do that in early access - and will wait until it’s done. When TaleWorlds launched M&B2 into early access in March 2020, they said they expected it to take about a year, so allowing for the usual early access holdups, mmmaybe this year? What I’ve seen of the sandbox medieval warfare RPG so far looks cracking. Well up for leading my own army into a siege while holding aloft some daft gert custom sword I forged myself.
Elden Ring
ELDEN RING - E3 Announcement TrailerWatch on YouTube
ELDEN RING - E3 Announcement Trailer
Ed:AhElden Ring, I don’t even know what you are. I’m cheating getting you on this list because you’re not even confirmed for this year. And yet, I yearn for a little tease. A little num num for your boy. All I know is that George R.R. Martin, theGame of Thronesman, has teamed up with Hidetaka Miyazaki, the mastermind behindDark Souls, and they are making a video game called Elden Ring.
Yakuza 6: The Song Of Life
Yakuza 6 also sees Kiryu spend much of his time in the quaint seaside town of Onomichi, which is a world away from the hustle and bustle of Kamurocho. Not only is it a wonderful place to explore, with its shrines and hushed streets, but it strips things back and lets you see a more vulnerable side of Kiryu, a man who maybe isn’t as indestructible as his chiselled torso lets on. But don’t worry, it’s still a huge amount of fun. There’s plenty of that bonkers side the Yakuza games are known for, including a fishing minigame which lets you go toe-to-toe with a giant squid.
Yakuza 6 is the perfect send-off for Kiryu, then. I say I want to play it again on PC, but I don’t actually know if I’m emotionally prepared to see my favourite yakuza dad swing fists one last time.
Mass Effect: Legendary Edition
Imogen:Mass Effect is a known quantity. But it’s also a phenomenal trilogy that I can’t wait to go back to. This sounds a bit silly because I could just do that with the copy I already own. I just haven’t had the heart to play through it all in years, mostly because I can’t stand playing the first game (and I can’t just skip to the second or third, I’m not a monster). Don’t get me wrong! The first Mass Effect sets up this incredible story of a ragtag bunch of weirdos going rogue to save the galaxy, and has, I think, one of the best villains in games. The story, the characters, the romances… it’s all just - chef’s kiss - great. It looks and controls, however, like ass.
Thankfully, out of all three games, ME1 is getting the most tweaks and improvements with the Legendary Edition remaster. Reworked cameras, weapon balancing, graphical updates to bring it in line with the second and third installments - it’s like music to my ears. I never stopped loving ME2 and ME3, and playing them again with a few enhancements will be lovely. But I’m most excited to simply enjoy ME1 again.
Also, hopefully the hot aliens will look even hotter with the new visuals. Priorities, BioWare.
Ed:Hello Mass Effect fans, lovely to meet you. I am sad to announce that I was once one a member of your club, but that membership expired aeons ago. You see, I played ME1 back in the day, and then proceeded to 2 but barely glanced at the tutorial before my progress came to a grinding halt. Now I don’t remember a thing about them, apart from a sliver of memory which says, “You enjoyed the first game, silly, why did you stop?”.
I don’t know, okay? But Mass Effect: Legendary Edition will give me a chance to right the wrongs of my past, and not only rekindle my relationship with the sci-fi RPG, but also the cool aliens I hung out with. I can’t wait to say hi to that big red lizard man again.
The Witcher III: Wild Hunt (Next-Gen Edition)
Katharine:Four words: ray traced bathtub Geralt.
NieR Replicant ver.1.22474487139…
Ed:I and a few friends blitzed through NieR: Automata in a week of chaos and emotion. A spectacular game it was, with a spectacular soundtrack. So the prospect of getting to play Nier: Replicant, a shiny, expanded prequel of likely equal chaos and emotion, has me pumped.
Disco Elysium: The Final Cut
Image credit:ZA/UM
Jake: I’ve put off playing Disco Elysium for so long, and I’m not really sure why. Luckily there’s Disco Elysium: The Final Cut coming in March, which adds full voice acting and extra story content. Once again I’ve missed the boat on a great game and it has ended up paying off massively.
