{"id":39376,"date":"2020-09-08T12:16:24","date_gmt":"2020-09-08T19:16:24","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/bensbargains.com\/thecheckout\/?p=39376"},"modified":"2020-09-09T10:33:37","modified_gmt":"2020-09-09T17:33:37","slug":"septembers-new-video-games-flex-muscle-before-next-gen-takes-over","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/bensbargains.com\/thecheckout\/features\/septembers-new-video-games-flex-muscle-before-next-gen-takes-over\/","title":{"rendered":"September’s New Video Games Flex Muscle Before Next-Gen Takes Over"},"content":{"rendered":"
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The strangeness of 2020 continues into September, as we\u2019ve reached the first month where school\u2019s trying to get started again in a variety of different shapes and sizes, virtual and in-person.  To say that things are still a bit awkward and different right now would be accurate, and the distraction of new video games could be more valuable than ever while people \u2013 youngins and older folks alike \u2013 are trying to get it all figured out.  Luckily, with the run-up to the release of new consoles in a few months, the releases that studios are trying to get squeezed in before this \u201cchanging of the guard\u201d have a lot of strength to \u2018em, through games both old and remastered involving heroes spread across fantasy, science-fiction, and comic-book franchises. Let\u2019s take a closer look.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Marvel\u2019s Avengers — September 4<\/h4>\n\n\n\n

Before the first Avengers <\/em>movie came out almost a decade ago now \u2013 gasp!<\/em> \u2013 those who knew about Marvel\u2019s supergroup of heroes mostly resided within the comic-book culture. Now, it\u2019s difficult to find people who haven\u2019t heard of \u2018em in some capacity \u2026 and while comic-book movies have been on the rise in popularity in the years leading up to Avengers<\/em>, the franchise has actually made it pretty darn commonplace to be a superhero fan. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Knowing this, Square Enix and Crystal Dynamics have made another attempt at bringing many characters together for a multi-superhero game, Marvel\u2019s Avengers<\/em>, which tries to spin an interesting new story and tap into the strong desire for a co-op action experience. What\u2019s often the problem with these types of team-up games is that dumping all these characters and their powers into one experience can result in safe and repetitive beat-\u2018em-up combat to accommodate for them all. The jury remains out on whether Marvel\u2019s Avengers can overcome those odds.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Get Marvel’s Avengers at Amazon<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

NBA 2K21 — September 4<\/h4>\n\n\n\n

The folks at 2K were there to pick up the slack when popularity ultimately got away from EA\u2019s NBA Live<\/em> series, delivering a critical and commercially reliable substitute for the basketball sim subgenre. Over the past few years, however, this franchise has started to struggle with some of the same pitfalls as other sports franchises, getting dinged for duplicating the past year\u2019s release too much and for microtransactions. Notably, 2K20 <\/em>raised some red flags with its somewhat blatantly advertised \u201cgambling\u201d laced within the game. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Rumblings about the latest installment in the franchise, 2K21<\/em>, have it pegged as being by and large the same experience both visually and mechanically as last year, with a few notable and potentially game-changing tweaks. The MyTeam aspect has been extensively deepened, currency and RNG concerns notwithstanding, and the controls for shooting have been made more complex \u2026 and promptly fixed for certain difficulty settings after early backlash from players.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Get NBA 2K21 at Amazon<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Kingdoms of Amalur: Re-Reckoning — September 8<\/h4>\n\n\n\n

The story behind Kingdoms of Amalur<\/em> is complex, full of baseball players, comic-book creators, government funding, abandoned MMO plans, and even the state of Rhode Island owning the IP at one point. Development and release ended up being a mess, and the game itself should\u2019ve been as well. Yet, somehow, the end result turned out to be a surprisingly entertaining, customizable, and visually captivating action-RPG that stood toe-to-toe with other second-tier genre titles of its time: not as good as Elder Scrolls <\/em>or Dark Souls<\/em>, but worth doing a pros-and-cons list against Dragon\u2019s Dogma<\/em>. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

THQ Nordic have given Kingdoms of Amalur<\/em> the \u201cremastered\u201d treatment with Re-Reckoning<\/em>, which leans much more into the spectrum of last-gen cleanup efforts instead of a reconstruction to feel current.  That isn\u2019t a bad thing, as the depth of the world-building and the sheer variety of character builds and atmospheres throughout the wide, explorable land will still speak for themselves.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Get Kingdoms of Amalur: Re-Reckoning on Amazon<\/strong><\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Crysis: Remastered — September 18<\/h4>\n\n\n\n

Where does Crysis<\/em> stand now, almost a decade and a half after its initial release? The hype around the game often reached ludicrous levels, with the highly advanced visual technology pushing the limits of people\u2019s PC rigs, frequently beyond the point of properly rendering the graphics. It became something of a joke, but in such a way that it got a lot of gamers involved in the PC culture and, specifically, in upgrading their computers to maximize the visual impact.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Underneath the glitz in Crysis<\/em> lies what\u2019s often considered to be a pretty serviceable sci-fi military shooter, sporting a middle-of-the-road storyline and comparatively linear design than other more open-world stealth shooters coming out at the time. Those shortcomings don\u2019t go away with time, but the hardware in both PCs and consoles have advanced enough to better handle the graphics, which Crytek has decided to accommodate with a remastered version of Crysis<\/em>. After delays to better refine the graphics for current-gen punch, it\u2019s coming into view.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Super Mario 3D All Stars — September 18<\/h4>\n\n\n\n

For many people, seeing Super Mario 64 <\/em>in action \u2013 probably at a display in a game store, perhaps at a shopping mall — transformed their perception of video games. While there had been 3D games before that, the vividness and fluidity of Nintendo\u2019s take on it while Mario moves in all directions really showed where at-home console titles were headed. Since, Nintendo has continued to explore modern takes on 2D Mario games, but anticipation always builds for the 3D releases when they arrive. <\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Super Mario 3D All Stars<\/em> brings together the delightful nostalgia of Super Mario 64<\/em> with the second and third 3D titles released afterwards: Super Mario Sunshine <\/em>for the Gamecube, and Super Mario Galaxy<\/em> for the Wii. All three have had their visuals updated in one way or another, and the control schemes have been adapted for the Switch\u2019s Joy Cons, specifically with the motion controls of Galaxy <\/em>simulated with them. Super Mario 3D All Stars<\/em> will be available only until March of 2021, so hop on it while you can.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Get Super Mario 3D All Stars at Amazon<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

WWE 2K Battlegrounds — September 18<\/h4>\n\n\n\n

Some sports franchises endure years where one installment gets lower marks than previous years, likely due to repeated features (read: a lack of improvement) and a sense that it\u2019s the same game. When a title gets lanced the way WWE 2K20<\/em> suffered last year, both the core game itself and the game-breaking bug it inherited at the beginning of the year, it might be time to go back to the drawing board.  While 2K figures out what to do with their realistic simulator, they along with Saber Interactive have developed a new, different wrestling game in the interim: Battlegrounds<\/em>. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

This is essentially the NBA Jam <\/em>of wrestling games, where real stars are given the oversized bobble head treatment and the gameplay has a far more arcade, animated style to the action. What\u2019s funny is that, in a weird way, the exaggerated facial expressions of the wrestlers seem to more realistically capture their presence and personalities, a stark contrast from the frequent \u201cuncanny valley\u201d issues that can arise with 2K\u2019s series proper.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Get WWE 2K Battlegrounds at Amazon<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

A scattering of other attention-grabbing titles are also coming out in September, including a pair of Vampire: The Masquerade<\/em> visual novels, Shadows of New York <\/em><\/strong>on September 10 and Night Road<\/em><\/strong> on September 24, as well as the second and third installments in the Tell Me Why<\/em><\/strong> interactive narrative. The remastering of Mafia<\/em><\/strong>, the Definitive Edition<\/em><\/strong>, will be coming out September 25, and \u2013 lo and behold! \u2013 Serious Sam 4<\/em><\/strong> will be storming onto the scene the day before, September 24. Also, for the racing fans, WRC 9<\/em><\/strong> (World Rally Championship<\/em>) zooms onto the scene on September 3. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The strangeness of 2020 continues into September, as we\u2019ve reached the first month where school\u2019s trying to get started again in a variety of different shapes and sizes, virtual and in-person.  To say that things are still a bit awkward and different right now would be accurate, and the distraction of new video games could […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":57,"featured_media":39380,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[12],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-39376","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-features"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/bensbargains.com\/thecheckout\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/39376","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/bensbargains.com\/thecheckout\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/bensbargains.com\/thecheckout\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bensbargains.com\/thecheckout\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/57"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bensbargains.com\/thecheckout\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=39376"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/bensbargains.com\/thecheckout\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/39376\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":39408,"href":"https:\/\/bensbargains.com\/thecheckout\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/39376\/revisions\/39408"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bensbargains.com\/thecheckout\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/39380"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/bensbargains.com\/thecheckout\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=39376"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bensbargains.com\/thecheckout\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=39376"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bensbargains.com\/thecheckout\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=39376"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}