Prime Gaming – November 2022

Is this month’s Prime Gaming just punishment for everything I said in the “Kerblam!” review? Don’t worry, all the boring stuff like the Flames of the Nether DLC for Minecraft Dungeons, the bundles for Two Point Hospital, and all the other tripe I don’t quite understand the point of continue. Yes, somehow Red Dead Online, GTA Online, Roblox, Marvel’s Avengers (HA!), Fall Guys, Dead By Daylight, Runescape, World of Tanks, and even sports releases like FIFA 23, keep farting out nonsense for your Prime subscriptions. Beyond this, it is a series of questionable choices and repeats of what we’ve seen at least once before.

If you thought Pixar’s Up was too cheery for you, well the first option this month is going to be right up your alley. Last Day of June is all the really depressing bits of that fantastic story with an eye-less horror art style standing front and center. In this short story-focused adventure you’ll go about solving a few puzzles and wondering why you have to be shown the same scene a few times without the ability to skip. Oh yeah, it is a time-travel sort of game, which should have been the first sign that a skip button on repeated scenes would be helpful. Charming to some and depressing to many, you can explore this nightmare this month if you haven’t already.

It seems we’re just cycling back through the Lucas Arts games missed over the last year, as we’re getting the predecessor of last August’s Indiana Jones and the Fate of Atlantis. Yes, Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade: The Graphic Adventure is the next title to set aside for people who need a reminder that A, adventure games work on moon logic half the time and B, why is Indiana Jones even that popular? Ok, the last one might just be me, but the only Doctor Jones I care about is the one that cured me of love that one time. It was either that or I went around the bend to reference Aqua’s other hit, so feel lucky!

I think this is the Legacy Games release, mostly due to its age, quality, and genre, but mostly it is the genre. Facility 47 is a 2014 hidden object adventure game with a hint of John Carpenter’s 1982 hit The Thing hanging over it thanks to the frozen antarctic setting. Is there really much else to say about this one? You don’t need to see a screenshot to know everything is designed to look like a Cold War hangover frozen over, and you’ll have to use a milk carton, a dart, and a BDSM whip to unlock a frozen-over chest somehow.

Finally, I can go back to my weekend job of talking about driving cars instead of hitting things with golf bats, and it is one that I’ve covered before. WRC 9 is the 2020 release of the long-running attempts to survive throwing yourself down a hill in a car full of scaffolding while a Finish man shouts at you in numbers. No, I’ve totally not been watching Kalle Rovanperä take the title this year while waiting for the release of KT Racing’s final game in the series with Generations. The truth is, I know I am crap at the WRC games but for some reason, I do enjoy them even if they are wildly infuriating at times.

I know I’ve spoken about Etherborn before as it was the first part of Prime back when the world was new to lockdowns, oh how innocent and wholesome we were back then. Released in 2019, this gravity-bending puzzle game does at least offer an interesting look at its abstract world, but that is seemingly it. With a story that is similarly away in the clouds to talk about some fluffy philosophical nonsense, you’ll spend more time swearing at the puzzles than you will at the story for being clever. Controlling very poorly may also contribute to that, though if you’re a fan of PS1 games you’ll be right at home.

Emo ghost teenagers, dark tones, and 2D adventure gameplay, it must be 2014’s Whispering Willows. A touch late to the party on this one, at least I think, as it is designed to be horror. This might have been a better option for October, the month of boring me to death with horror themes. Nonetheless Night Light Interactive and Prime Gaming push ahead with a game so dark it is giving episodes of Game of Thrones a run for their money, and it is a lot of money pumped into the same plot as some of those online PPV videos I’ve heard so much about.

Ok, onto the one I teased back on Friday during the Epic Games Store article, Fallout: New Vegas – Ultimate Edition. A run-on from last month’s vomit-inducing Fallout 76 and the Ultimate Edition of Fallout 3 which was on the Epic Games Store rotation a couple of weeks ago, this is the one that we’ve all heard copious amounts of praise about. The simple truth is that I don’t know why. Hearing the constraints and the stories surrounding New Vegas is impressive, but the game itself doesn’t light a fire under me. Personally, I was late to the party for New Vegas so part of that has to be how clunky and unenthused it is pushing the player into exploration.

Normally I restrict myself to one paragraph here, but I’d rather defend my position than get suggestions on Twitter for mods and how to copulate with myself. I’m not saying New Vegas is a bad game, and in fact, I agree with many of the positions on its quality due to the 18-month time frame it was made in and the resulting controversy with Metacritic scores being tied to bonuses, but it is not my go-to game in the series. From my perspective, Fallout 4 is the more well-rounded game that pushes you to explore, not due to the campaign but the use of all the junk to make settlements.

Of course, as it is the Ultimate Edition, you’re looking at not just getting the highly praised New Vegas and Matthew Perry’s dry delivery but also all the expansions. Though I hold the opinion that most if not all of Fallout‘s expansions (3, New Vegas, and 4) are little more than tacked-on pieces you could take or leave, it does include the highly praised Old World Blues and Lonesome Road DLCs. The other inclusions to the Ultimate Edition of New Vegas are Dead Money, Honest Hearts, Gun Runners’ Arsenal, and Courier’s Stash.