By Nelson Schneider - 06/28/26 at 03:50 PM CT
Welcome back to another look into the near future! This July, the U.S.A. will turn 250 years old! That’s quite the accomplishment! But based on how the Games Industry is doing, it might not have very many more birthdays ahead of it before it crashes and burns again. It has been over 40 years since the last crash. That’s nothing to sneeze at, and it did give us a lot of timeless classics that we can enjoy forever... so long as we’re willing to ignore copyright laws. Let’s see if there’s anything coming in the middle of the Summer Games Drought that’s worthy of fireworks!
Ugh... there’s more shovelware than anything else coming in July. And it’s in EVERY category. In the Licensed Swill category, we’ve got “Nickelodeon Extreme Tennis: Next!” “Starship Troopers: Ultimate Bug War!” (What’s with the exclamation marks on the titles? Do publishers think that will make the shovelware less crappy?) “PAW Patrol: Dino World” (combining the two things little kids love most: puppies and dinosaurs), and “Echoes of Aincrad” (which is apparently both a Soulslike and based on the “Sword Art Online” anime). In the Casual Non-Game Swill category, there’s “K-Pop Idol Stories: Road to Debut.” In the Annualized Swill category, there’s a new ‘EA College Football’ entry. And in Noteworthy Ports, Ubisoft is giving us a remake of “Assassin’s Creed: Black Flag,” Xbox is giving us (including Sony Ponies) a remake of the original “Halo,” and THQ is inflicting “Gothic” (one of the worst Dark Fantasy Action games of all time – that predated ‘Dark Souls’) on a new generation of unsuspecting rubes.
In legitimate, new multi-platform releases we have... four games... all in genres I can’t stand. “Mouse: P.I. for Hire” is a Boomer Shooter that’s trying to do the same 1920’s animation style that helped push “Cuphead” into the spotlight. “Kusan: City of Wolves” is a top-down Carnage SHMUP, similar to things like “Smash T.V.” and “Hotline Miami.” “Truxton Extreme” is a sequel in an ancient side-scrolling Bullet Hell SHMUP series that was designed by a classical pianist to require the same kind of muscle memory as playing that particular instrument. And, lastly, there’s “Disgaea Mayhem,” an Action/RPG take on the traditionally super-grindy Tactical RPG franchise by NIS that still looks incredibly stupid and unplayable.
Finally, we come to exclusives. How many systems are these things going to sell? Not many from the look of it! PlayStation isn’t getting anything. Xbox (LOL, Xbox) isn’t getting anything (but really, what did you expect?). PC isn’t getting anything... that’s announced ahead of time (it will be flooded with low-effort Indie Slop on a daily basis). That leaves Nintendo: And they’re getting two exclusives for July! “Rhythm Heaven Groove” is a sequel in Nintendo’s 2009 DS series of low effort Rhythm games. “Splatoon Raiders” is a single-player spinoff of Nintendo’s primarily PVP-focused, paint-based Third-Person Shooter IP. I wouldn’t play either of those, even if they were free.
Deeeee-sgusting! Another month, another ZERO new game releases to get excited about.
Backlog Embiggened: +0
