By Nelson Schneider - 07/31/25 at 02:16 PM CT
Welcome back to another look into the near future! It’s Bakc 2 Skwell time again for all the little illiterate TikTokers. As usual, just when their target audience no longer has as much free time to swallow Tide Pods, eat cups of raw cinnamon, or kick down random doors, the Games Industry suddenly drops a whole bunch of releases, ending the doldrums of the Summer Games Drought. But, as usual, those of us with taste and acumen are left with the task of determining whether the Drought is actually over, or if those droplets falling from the Heavens aren’t actually rain.
We’ve got lots of Shovel-Ready trash coming in August, with Licensed Swill including games based on the ‘90s-era ‘Goosebumps’ children’s horror novels, the ‘80s-era ‘Space Adventure Cobra’ anime (which is on RetroCrush ALL the time, and it too cringey to watch), the relatively recent anime ‘Demon Slayer,’ and the ‘80s-era ‘RoboCop’ movie (with the new ‘RoboCop’ game being a sequel to 2023’s surprisingly-well-received “RoboCop: Rogue City”), alongside a single Annualized Swill release in “Madden (Football) ’26.” Of course, we’ll still need to keep our shovels at the ready, as August is getting quite a few Noteworthy Ports, including console versions of “Metal Slug Tactics,” an $80 cross-gen upgrade of “Kirby and the Forgotten Land” for the Switch 2, plus remastermakes of “Metal Gear Solid: Snake Eater” and the original “Gears of War.”
There are a handful of new Multi-Platform titles coming in August, with quite the variety of genres… plus a lot of satirical deconstruction. “Date Everything!” is a Sandbox Dating Sim where the player can develop romantic relationships with a wide variety of inanimate objects. “Story of Seasons: Grand Bazaar” is the latest real ‘Harvest Moon’ sequel from the original developers (who knew there would be so much drama centered upon boring ‘cozy’ Rural Life Sims?). “Discounty” is… ANOTHER Rural Life Sim, this time looking to blend the vibes of “Stardew Valley,” “Item Shop Simulator,” and… maybe a little “Earthbound,” judging by the music in the trailer… but no thanks, anyway. “Mafia: The Old Country” is a ‘Mafia’ prequel, taking place in early 20th Century Sicily… which I suppose is better than most Crime Sandboxes, but still… I’ll pass. Then there’s a new, console-centric sequel to the crusty old ‘Flying Aces’ Aerial Combat Sim series, “Flying Aces: Legend of the Red Baron.”
Finally, we come to system-selling exclusives! What does Nintendo have in store for us to tempt us into picking up a Switch 2? … NOTHING! Instead, the Old Switch, is getting one of its last Visual Novels, “Iwakura Aria,” while Steam is getting the timed-exclusive (for 2 months) release of “Bendy: Lone Wolf,” which is a Roguelike (nope!) starring an old-school animation-style wolf-man (who looks a lot like Disney’s Goofy). Weirdly, the game was developed by an Indie programmer named Joey Drew, so I initially confused this game with “Lone Wolf” by Joe Dever. They are not the same. Don’t do that.
Oh, no. Sad Birthday to me, nothing is coming in August that I’m even remotely interested in. Yeah, I haven’t gotten around to “Kirby and the Forgotten Land” on my OG Switch yet, but there’s no way I’d drop money on a Switch 2 and a full-priced copy of the port just for a few minor enhancements. EFF that, Nintendo!
Backlog Embiggened: +0
