Mostly spent the month playing DLC, but I completed them both so normal service is resumed.
Games completed this month
Forza Horizon 5: Rally Adventure – Xbox Series X
Had a great time with the Rally content for Forza Horizon 5, and while I was back into the game I did some of the monthly season content too. Still my favourite racing game.
Vampire Survivors: Tides of the Foscari – Xbox Series X
Much like the last DLC for Vampire Survivors, it’s still just more of the same, but that’s not a complaint. I’ll happily do it again for a few more content packs too.
Games played during April
Tell Me Why – Xbox Series X
Didn’t get far yet but I did start this. Played just enough to confirm it feels like a Life is Strange game, so will will hopefully play more.
Gears 5 – Xbox Series X
Found time for a bit more Gears progress with my buddy. I still hate the open world areas, but otherwise the game is great. Some of the finest co-op gameplay going.
Dead Cells – Xbox Series X
I think I’m finally done with Dead Cells. Hit a bit of a wall playing with 3 Boss Cells active, and I’m not enjoying it so much. I may come back to it if any more content turns up, but I’ve had a good run either way.
I’m playing on Xbox because it’s on GamePass, although if it hadn’t been I probably would have gone for the Switch edition* as it’s the perfect type of game to take when you’re travelling.
Castlevania: Lords of Shadow – Xbox Series X
I played a bit more of this at the start of the month but haven’t touched it for a couple of weeks. Worried that might be it for this again, but I won’t write it off just yet.
Octopath Traveller 2 – PlayStation 5
This hasn’t taken over my life as much as I expected yet, but I think the DLC for other games was too much of a distraction, I’m only 8 or so hours in but really enjoying it so far. The first game was really good, but it’s nice to see how well things have been polished to improve on it. The lighting in particular on the PS5 does make it look really impressive, despite the use of 2d sprites on 3d backgrounds.
It’s on Switch and PS4 as well, which may suit. I was glad to get another reason to play some PS5 though, and picked up this physical edition*.
Turtles Shredder’s Revenge – Xbox Series X
Had friends over, and after an hour or two on the arcade cabinet, we moved to the consoles. Dabbled with a couple of smaller games, then we settled on Turtles. 3 player arcade mode (Donatello, Casey Jones and Raphael if you were wondering), great fun. Sadly at the last boss 2 of us were already dead and out of continues, so we didn’t make the clear. I need to buy Streets of Rage 4 for next time, haven’t played that since it left GamePass.
Street Fighter 6 Demo – PlayStation 5
Although I’m going to play Street Fighter 6 on Xbox, the demo was released a week early on PlayStation so I grabbed it on there. Waste of time really, nothing much to do in the traditional Street Fighter sense unless you want to spar with a friend using Luke & Ryu. Otherwise there is an introduction to the new single player World Tour mode. I played half an hour of that, which was just long enough to establish I won’t be going anywhere near it in the full game. Ghastly.
The fighting itself still feels great though, I played a couple of goes against the CPU, but then deleted the demo to just wait for the full game.
What’s been on the arcade?
Ten pence arcade head a double header of Moon Cresta and Uniwar S. Managed a few credits on each and put in a couple of mid-table scores. Also 2 years after building the machine, I found the ‘mute’ button, so I’ve been able to leave it running other games without the attract mode demo noises annoying me. Has opened it up to lots more games that I can have ready for ‘just one quick go’.
As mentioned above as well, having a couple of friends over the cab really came into its own. Lots of arcade brawlers and vs fighters were played.
Pick ups during April
Arcade Components
Don’t think I bought any games this month, probably forgetting something though. Anyway I did grab these few parts from Arcade World UK* for a couple of projects. I’ll probably blog about them both separately when I’m happy with them, but it’s basically the buttons I need to mod the fight stick I bought in March, and a couple of bits to use to create a “Spinner” type controller to use with my PC.
*As usual, these links are affiliate ones, which may earn me a small commission if you buy something.