We’re at GDC 2023 in an effort to learn about the latest and greatest games coming to any and all platforms.
Greetings, dear Gamezebo readers. We’re at GDC 2023 in an effort to learn about the latest and greatest games coming to any and all platforms. To help make the coverage easy for you to parse, we’re going to condense everything we see into a single story on each day. If we see something particularly exciting though, we may branch out into individual stories, but we’ll link to it from this. So, bookmark this story and check it out throughout the day.
It’s Zak and myself here this year, and we’ve both got our meeting planners stacked with some of the best developers and publishers. So, you can bet that we’ll have some great stories for you right here on Gamezebo.
Meanwhile, Adele and Meriel are hard at work on bringing you fresh content for all new releases, so it should be an exciting week for Gamezebo! We wish you a great week and hope you enjoy the content.
Memory’s Reach is 100 Stones Interactive’s upcoming project. The developer has revealed that one of it’s greatest influences is the metroidvania sub-genre, and the gameplay really highlights this.
The game itself sees you explore a mysteriously vacant alien planet from a first person perspective. Each level contains a plethora of brain-teasing puzzles that you’ll have to solve in order to navigate yourself around the planet. What’s interesting about the game is that, along with the range of mini-puzzles, the environment itself is a quest that you’ll have to solve in order to move onto the next level.
Memory’s Reach is coming to PC and Mac. 100 Stones Interactive doesn’t have a release date confirmed just yet, but the studio is aiming for a late 2023/early 2024 release. Check out the game on Steam.
-Zak
We caught up with Asym this afternoon, and learned all about the upcoming asymmetric shooter, Asym Altered Axis.
It supports six players, with a team of five infiltrators versus a single defender. The infiltrators play in third person, while the defender plays in first.
Effectively, it’s Dead by Daylight in reverse. The infiltrators have to steal the defender’s nexus, while the defender has to stave them off.
The defender’s job is a lot more dense than the infiltrator’s. First you have to build your base, customising the aesthetics. If you want to build a base that represents a fiery hellscape, this is the game for you.
You can also completely customise your defences, adding traps like swinging pendulums, as well as buildings an units that will attack your opponents.
Then, when the battle commences, you fly above the map, using ultimate abilities to destroy your opponents. These include dropping icy walls and a meteor storm.
Asym Altered Axis is in alpha right now, with a beta to follow tentatively in Q4 of this year. We’ll keep you posted as this develops.
-Glen
Shueisha Games presents: Arcana Of Paradise! The game is a side-scrolling adventure game set entirely in a tower, and the story follows a group of 20 children who live at the very top. After the children overhear a rumour that teases a paradise at the bottom, they attempt to traverse the dangerous floors in pairs.
Each kid has their own unique ability, and they work differently depending on their combo. Experiment to find out which ones are the best, and fight to get to the bottom of the tower! Once you’ve gotten to the bottom, you’ll have to repeat the process with a different pair, until all 20 children have made it out safely.
Arcana Of Paradise comes out on April 20th, and it will be available on Steam and the Nintendo Switch.
-Zak
Prolific PC and Switch publisher Secret Mode joined us at GDC to talk primarily about its upcoming ‘PowerWash Swimulator’ (Secret Mode’s pun, not ours).
Its actual title, Loddlenaut, draws a lot of inspiration from PowerWash Simulator and The Gunk, and sees you trawl the ocean floor in search of pollution, which you clean up.
You befriend acquiatic creatures, unlock new gadgets, and recycle trash and turn it into items that will help you on your adventure.
You can check out Loddlenaut right now on Steam, with a demo launching just prior to GDC 2023. The full launch will follow later this year.
-Glen
We caught up with Kwalee, who’s working on a whopping nine games at the moment – five of which are likely launching this year. We can’t talk about all of these games, but we can talk about a few of them.
We learned a bit about Scathe, which launched last year. It’s kind of like Doom meets Left 4 Dead. You battle hordes of demons in drop in/drop-out cooperative multiplayer. The art style, in particular, is nice in this one. Check out those colours on Steam!
Next up is Wildmender, which is an adorable survival game that takes place in a scorching desert. You have to build out a flourishing town in the middle of a desert by utilising an oasis. You’ll carve out rivers in the sand, plant life-sustaining vegetation, and craft items that are useful in your adventure.
You can do it all together with friends, too, as well as go on adventures, tackling huge monsters and exploring dangerous territory. Again, the art style is lovely. It’s reminiscent of Journey as well as the Alto’s games on mobile. You can check out a playable demo right now on Steam.
Die by the Blade is a Soul Calibur-like 1v1 weapon-based fighter that exists in a “samuraipunk world”. You wield a wide variety of Japanese weapons as you strive to defeat your opponents. What we particularly like about this game is the fully 3D environments, that allow you a far greater range of movement than other 1v1 fighting games.
Check out the demo right now on Steam.
Lastly, we learned about Robobeat. This is a shooter very much in a similar vein to Metal: Hellsinger or Hi-Fi Rush. You have to shoot in rhythm to the beat, maximising your damage. You can also wall run, grapple, hook, slide, and bunny hop – so expect the past to be lightning fast.
You can check out a demo right now, but you have to join the official Discord and request a code from there. You can also learn more about it on the Steam page.
-Glen
Fort Solice is a third person narrative thriller that’s set on the surface of Mars in 2083. While responding to a maintenance call, Jack Leary arrives at Fort Solis to find it seemingly abandoned by it’s crew. Now, Jack must get to the bottom of the presented mystery, and uncover the hidden truth surrounding the base.
Fallen Leaf Studio is proud of the game’s use of no cuts or edits, providing you a truly cinematic and immersive experience. The game is planned to release on PS5 and Steam in quarter three of 2023.
The third episode of the Pixel Ripped series developed by ARVORE, Pixel Ripped 1978, is on it’s way! The VR game puts you in the shoes of fan favourite character, Dot, as you attempt to save Bug’s childhood memories from Cyblin Lord. Transport yourself through multi-dimensional puzzles in a celebration and tribute to gaming in the late 70s.
Pixel Ripped 1978 is coming to PlayStation VR and Steam in the Summer of 2023.
Based on long-lost concept art for a 1999 Dreamcast game, Slave Zero X is a third person mech shooter. The game, developed by Poppy Works, takes a 2D approach, in combination with 3D environments – the developer describes this as 2.5D! Hack and slash your way through a biopunk dystopia that’s filled with a bunch of extra lore and story.
Slave Zero X is coming to Steam, as well as a variety of console platforms soon. While the release date is currently unconfirmed, you can add it to your Steam wishlist now.
Abylight Barcelona’s latest and greatest One Military Camp recently hit the Steam stores in an early access build. The game is a city management/strategy game that takes place in a country where enemies have taken over. Play as Sergeant Hawkins to build and grow your camp, increase your defenses, and take back the country piece-by-piece.
The game contains three biomes up to now, but the full release will increase this to five. There’s also an upcoming sandbox mode, as well as a possible multiplayer. The game leaves early access in September 2023, and it’s currently available on Steam.
