What are we all playing this weekend?
Well?
Not-E3 2022 is over, and we can all agree: it took place. Onwards! Or for our friends in England and Wales, downwards, into a puddle, melted by the heat. Still, the Steam Next Fest is underway, with so many great demos to try out if you can maintain your corporeal form this weekend. So what are you playing this weekend? Here's what we're clicking on!
Alice Bee
Now that Not E3 is over I'm going to put some time into Steam Next Fest. I've been playing the demo for Necrosmith which is honestly so much fun. You're a necromancer and you build little undead monsters from jigsaw parts of limbs that have different attributes and abilities. Then send them out into the world to do your dark bidding (destroying castles).
Alice0
I have, of course, immediately lost my dubious Neon White 'world record', and must attempt to reclaim it. Who knows, maybe I'll even stop playing the same level over and over and actually finish the speedrunning FPS's story. Beyond that, I must check out the door-kicking violence of Anger Foot's demo.
CJ
Demos, demos, demos. Meaning the populace of a democracy, or just free slices of games to play through. How egalitarian! That's what I'll be doing in the evenings this weekend while Steam Next Fest is still up and running. At the top of my list to give a go is probably Resistance Games' grand strategy Great Houses Of Calderia, where you have to build your family's power over generations in a fantasy land modelled on the Renaissance. I'm also well up for the mystery game We Stay Behind, about a small town that's going to be squished by a comet. Crack out the titanium brollies.
Ed
I'm going to give that Cult Of The Lamb demo a go, it looks cute and unnerving. Might even go back to Elden Ring now that my exhaustion has passed. What was I doing? Where was I? I don't know!
Hayden
After getting through just over half the game last week, I'm hoping to find time to finish The Quarry this weekend. I also just bought Ni No Kuni: Wrath Of The White Witch Remastered, which is just lovely. Those Ghibli cutscenes are gorgeous, and Drippy constantly has me laughing. Although, I'm fairly sure he's gaslighting our Ollie-boy, so I'm very cautious about his motives.
James
It's too hot to play games. Mostly. I do want to try Neon White - 'going fast' has long supplanted actual shooting as my favourite thing to do in FPS games - though I've also become fixated on a new Minecraft world, having miss-clicked my last one into an early deletion. First and last time I'll commit omnicide by accident, promise.
Katharine
is away.
Liam
Neon White launched this week! Therefore, my plan for the weekend involves dashing through heaven, killing demons and drinking too much Lucozade (I have the 'rona, and I've convinced myself that Lara Croft’s favourite drink is medicine, actually, thanks very much). Alice's piece on the game has gotten me extremely excited, so I can't wait to dive in. I've also restarted the Resident Evil 2 remake to try out the fancy new graphics options but that’s on PS5 so who cares.
Ollie
I'm absolutely besotted with The Cycle: Frontier at the moment. Between the closed beta and the full game, I've now put about 100 hours into The Cycle, and I just can't stop playing. Given how hot it's been lately, I can't think of anything I want to do more than to listen to one of The Cycle's wonderful storms batter away at the dingy little building I'm using as cover.
Rebecca
I'm taking a long weekend to recoup some of my overtime from Not-E3, during which I hope to finish The Quarry. I'm about halfway through and to be honest I'm finding it unexpectedly disturbing in comparison to other Supermassive games (which until now I hadn't considered were particularly pulling their punches). Which isn't to say I'm not enjoying it; it's fantastically well done, just rather… nasty. Still, I've grown very attached to my group of plucky youngsters and am determined to get as many out alive as I can, which means that as a camp counsellor simulator it's presumably spot-on.
But you, reader dear, what are you playing this weekend?