What We're Playing

I am back from my Scottish absence, which means that instead of being prepared a week in advance, this article is being written in real-time. Click on it quick enough and you can see my cursor still scrabbling across the screen, laying out words about three new games you might like to try this coming weekend - and, as a new bonus, adding words from the Jank crew on what we're hoping to divert ourselves with this weekend.

Let us know in the comments, as always, what you're going to be playing.

Sovereign Tower

I've been reading Tower Dungeon, Tsutomu Nihei's manga which answers the question: what if there was a big tower? This RPG makes you the manager of such a place, with a Round Table of hot knights to send on quests and keep happy. I love the loose lines of the character artwork and UI, and am encouraged by the ability to turn back time (via a demon in the basement) to reverse previous decisions.

Doloc Town

If I encountered Doloc Town when it launched in Early Access last year, I forgot about it, but this sidescrolling survival-farming game has now hit

As you read this, I am still on holiday where, baggage allowance permitting, I will be playing games on my Steam Deck. Which games, I have no idea. Thankfully I have prepared in advance and below you will find your usual collection of games you could be playing. Where would you be without me?

Tell us what you are playing in the comments below.

Scarlet Deer Inn

A side-scrolling medieval folk tale in which every frame of character animation was created via embroidery. I have no idea how this plays out in practice - Thank Goodness You're Here meets Pentiment? - but it looks beautiful and I'm keen to find out.

Hand Of Fate: Hordes

Hand Of Fate was a beloved tactical deckbuilder that seemingly didn't perform well enough to support its developers, who effectively closed down after Hand Of Fate 2. Now a bunch of former staff have re-formed under a new studio to bring some of the series' crunchy deckbuilding into a bullet hell context. It's out in Early Access now.

Offbeat

Music is better than videogames, so here's a management tycoon game in which you construct your own recording studio, collect musical

I survived my camping adventure and am now barrelling head first into the school summer holidays, with flights booked to visit family next week. Before that happens I've got one weekend spare to queue up some Jank articles and play some videogames. Let's decide what I should play.

You can help. Tell us what you're playing in the comments down below.

MARVEL Tōkon: Fighting Souls

I'm not really into fighting games or Marvel, but a lack of genre interest has never stopped me playing an Arc Systems Works game in the past. They have tremendous artists and animators, and bringing all their talent with colour and keyframes from their Guilty Gear series works to breathe new life into characters made mundane by the movies. Fighting Souls doesn't launch until early August, but it's in open beta now.

Go-Go Town!

A cute, toy town Animal Crossing-like in which you gradually bring a town to life by tidying, fishing and running errands for the locals. It differs from most of its inspirations in two ways: its set in a more bustling urban environment rather than a pastoral village, and it eventually leads you towards

Nothing makes me feel quite so motivated as a camping trip, and not in a good way. It's like when you get to the end of a long holiday and right before you're due to return to work, you feel this sudden burst of inspiration to do all the things you soon won't be able to. I could have started a running habit or become the sort of person who gets up at 6am and meditates, but alas, I'm going camping this weekend. I could have played all these new videogames, but alas, I'm going camping this weekend.

Here's what you could be playing. Tell us what you are playing in the comments below.

The Mermaid Mask

The latest game in the Detective Grimoire series, and another standalone mystery to solve. This one is a locked room murder, and unlike its predecessor, every clue is a 3D object you can rotate and explore in search of secrets. It's also fully voiced and wonderfully animated, if the trailers are any indication. I need to make time to play this.

Denshattack!

Jet Set Radio if instead of a skateboard you were flipping and grinding as

Wall Week, our weeklong celebration of putting up our paywall, is nearing its end. As Brendy explained, many posts will remain outside that paywall each week, including weekly regulars like this one, and including your ability to comment on those articles. We made the decision early on to make commenting free because we want Jank to feel like a community; a cool place to hang out and chat, even if you don't have the money to hand over when Brendy tries a shakedown.

So come in, pull up a chair. Tell us what you're going to be playing this weekend.

Moonlight Peaks

Ever since I completed Pokémon Pokopia, I've been looking for a new game to give me errands to do. Moonlight Peaks looks like it could be that game, as a supernatural life sim in which you play as a vampire, befriend the local witches and mermaids, and spend your time potion-making and, of course, growing crops and fishing.

Echoes Of Aincrad

It's been a surprise to me that there aren't more isekai videogames, given the genre's ubiquity and popularity in anime. It's especially odd given how many isekai anime are

The Steam summer sale continues, which means there's still a relative paucity of new game releases. There's nothing inherent in this weekly feature that requires the three games I pick to be new, but still I have rummaged around behind the sofa to pick three relatively recent games that seem worth your time.

As always, tell us what you are playing in the comments below.

Casualties: Unknown demo

This is a demo I've had open in a browser tab since its release back in April. Delve into caves on alien planets in search of lost cargo, and deal with the strange, hostile environments you find. I'm most interested in this because it has "simulated limb and cardiovascular systems" that require you to fight infections and apply bandages to body parts in order to survive injury. I love a granular wounding system.

Voidling Bound

A "creature collector", but far from a Pokémonlike. This looks like a third-person Risk Of Rain 'em up, in which you find and hatch alien creatures, cross-breed and evolve them with Spore-style body-part combinations, and then directly control one of your choice in wave-based combat. That combat is

The Steam Summer sale is underway, which means you may be playing the ancient game of, Do I Really Need To Buy This Now Or Am I Merely Seeking Dopamine. It's a surprisingly popular game considering the answer is always the same. It's dopamine. You already own dozens of games you haven't played, right?

Here are three new games through which you could seek dopamine this weekend.

Empulse

You might never get a Titanfall 3, but Empulse looks like a pretty good consolation. It's a 6v6 multiplayer first-person shooter with wall-running, grapple hooks and pilotable mechs. Its unique idea - or at least, the idea it borrowed from a game other than Titanfall - is paint bombs which you can throw down to apply effects to surfaces, creating faster movement, bigger leaps, and stickiness.

Moldwasher

There are so, so many games about tidying up in the wake of PowerWash Simulator, but Moldwasher is at least visually distinct by being in isometric 2D. Better yet, you take control of a tiny nigiri sushi,

This has been another relatively quiet week for game releases, because what you're supposed to be playing are the demos released as part of Next Fest. I'd personally recommend Blood Dungeon. If you once had a traumatic experience with a coverdisc and now the idea of a demo triggers a panic attack, fret not: I've still pulled out three newly released games you could play instead.

Tell us what you are playing in the comments, whether it's a demo or not.

The Adventures Of Elliot: The Millennium Tales

The demo of Elliot released several weeks ago and its combat and art style won me over, even if its story and characters seemed gratingly anaemic. That seems to be the broad consensus from reviewers now the full adventure/tale is available. This is a Zelda-style action-RPG with real-time combat rendered in Square Enix's 2D-HD style, and seems to promise a good time as long as you're happy to turn your brain (and maybe ears) off.

City Car Driving 2.0

I played a lot of the original City Car Driving and this sequel offers the same straight-faced simulation of traffic