Author: Emily Medlock

I’ve long been fascinated by Japan, by its general culture and history alongside specific areas such as the country’s mythology and feudal era, not to mention more contemporary elements such as Japanese cinema and videogames. The Japan-set, cloying, inane, unpolished mess that is Akiba’s Trip: Undead & Undressed didn’t manage to strangle that fascination, although it had a damn good go. Developed by Acquire and published (in Europe, at least) by NIS America, Akiba’s Trip: Undead & Undressed is… well, it tries to be a number of things. It’s a beat-‘em-up, an action-RPG, a visual novel and a dating sim…

I’ve always been a big fan of horror fiction in any medium and videogames are no exception, my love of horror games going back to the days of the original Resident Evil on PlayStation, not to mention some horror-themed games that preceded it, such as the Splatterhouse series. And although I’ve played a number of great horror games over the years, up until a few weeks ago the last horror game that really inspired any genuine dread and tension within me was the fantastic – and criminally underrated – ZombiU on Wii U. Then I bought a PlayStation 4 and…

In a shocking turn of events, Sony Online Entertainment has been acquired by the investment firm Colombus Nova. SOE, which rose to fame as the publisher of EverQuest, one of the first successful MMORPGs, will now be known as the Daybreak Game Company, and will go forward as an independent game studio. For players who currently enjoy Daybreak’s catalog of games, which include the DC Comics-themed MMORPG DC Universe Online, PayDay: The Heist, and PlanetSide, this may not seem like a big deal. Daybreak promises that their current games will continue operations as normal, while in-development titles like EverQuest Now…

With a new month comes a new round of games for Sony’s Instant Game Collection, the free game service for PlayStation Plus subscribers. While January’s offerings were dominated by big-name downloadable titles, February’s free game selection is a little more diverse, with a handful of indie games (including two brand new titles) as well as two older AAA-titles. The biggest game on the PlayStation 4 is Transistor, the sophomore title from Bastion developer Supergiant games. Transistor focuses on Red, a lounge singer from the city of Cloudbank, who must keep a giant talking broadsword out of enemy hands. The game’s…