What to play in January. Game releases of the month
The beginning of the year is not often happy with interesting, especially AAA games, so January 2023 was no exception. Although by the end of the month we will have several expected projects, as well as interesting discoveries.
One Piece Odyssey
Genre: RPG
Date of: 13th of January
Platform: PC, PS4, PS5, Xbox One, Xbox Series X|S
One Piece Odyssey is a turn-based combat role-playing game for the Straw Hat Pirates. Exploring the world, the player can switch between all the characters, which is due to the gameplay. Each of the characters has unique abilities and skills that are used to overcome obstacles, solve puzzles and other tasks.
Fights take place in separate battle arenas that can be influenced by random events dubbed “Drama Stages”. For example, Sanji can be surrounded by women and be unable to perform any actions during the fight.
The game was supposed to be released back in September, but the release was delayed until January 13th.
Farlanders
Genre: strategy
Date of: January 17
Platform: PC
City-building economic strategy about the colonization and teraformation of Mars from the Ukrainian developer Andriy Bychkovsky. Although the game is being developed by one person, it is a full-fledged economic strategy, with different resources, development branches and construction chains necessary for the life of people structures.
The Farlanders feature is a random map generation and a full-fledged story mode, the prologue of which is already available on Steam for free.
Persona 3 Portable and Persona 4 Golden
Genre: RPG
Date of: January 19
Platform: PC, PS4, PS5, Xbox One, Xbox Series X|S
The number of re-releases and updates of the Persona series will envy even Todd Howard with his Skyrim. So on the consoles of the current and past generations, finally, Persona 3 Portable and Persona 4 Golden will appear.
Persona, or Shin Megami Tensei: Persona, is an offshoot of the Shin Megami Tensei series and takes the adventure and everyday life of high school students.
The gameplay is distributed between the life of an ordinary schoolboy and the fight against evil, the so-called Shadows. The combat system is centered around Personas, which are the main combat unit in the war against evil.
Forspoken
Genre: Action RPG
Date of: January 24
Platform: PC, PS5
American Frey Holland gets into the fantasy world of Atia, gets a pack of magical abilities and is now trying to find an opportunity to return to her native New York.
Forspoken is still the dark horse of this year, even the demo does not give a definitive answer whether the new game from the authors of Final Fantasy XIII/XV will be successful.
Dead Space Remake
Genre: Action Horror
Date of: January 27
Platform: PC, PS5, Xbox Series X|S
Electronic Arts is trying to breathe new life into old franchises, for some, a new game in the series (Dragon Age, Mass Effect, Need for Speed) should be a revival, in the case of Dead Space, this is a full-fledged remake. In addition to the updated visuals, the developers have also added a few new elements, such as the “director of horror”, as in the Left 4 Dead series, which should make your playthrough a bit unique.
As an example, at one moment a Necromorph can jump out of the ventilation, while for another player this episode will be a little calmer. According to other innovations, Isaac spoke up and received a new appearance, which not all fans liked. Although, to be honest, there were few episodes in the game in which we saw the face of the protagonist.
Season: A Letter to the Future
Genre: Adventure
Date of: January 31
Platform: PC, PS4, PS5
An inevitable cataclysm is coming. The main character travels by bicycle and tries to collect as many artifacts and information about the life and habits of people as possible for future generations who managed to survive.
Season: A Letter to the Future is a meditative adventure with easy puzzles and cultural exploration.
SpongeBob SquarePants: The Cosmic Shake
Genre: platformer
Date of: January 31
Platform: PC, Switch, PS4, Xbox One
New – the ideological sequel to SpongeBob SquarePants: Battle for Bikini Bottom – Rehydrated from the same authors. Unlike Battle for Bikini Bottom, in the new game we decided to focus on one game character – Sponge Bob, but the brilliant Krabby Patty maker was endowed with different abilities, and our best friend Patrick will help us, though in the form of a balloon.
Battle for Bikini Bottom – Rehydrated, although it suffered from the game design of the early 2000s, was an excellent remaster. We are looking forward to a full-fledged new part in the series. Moreover, there are not so many platformers coming out, and the next Crash Bandicoot changed the genre.
Age of Empires II: Definitive Edition
Genre: RTS
Date of: January 31
Platform: PC (2019), Xbox One, Xbox Series X|S
When exclusives are fiercely fought across platforms, real-time strategy has been the last argument in favor of the PC, but for a very long time this genre has also felt good on consoles. The remastered version of Age of Empires II, the game from 2000, features 4K, remastered audio, and a brand new campaign, The Last Khans. The console version will get keyboard and mouse support, as well as crossplay with PC players.
Later this year, Age of Empires IV will also be released on consoles.
Superfuse
Genre: Action, RPG
Date of: January 31
Platform: PC (Early Access)
Superfuse is a four-player cooperative top-down hack-n-slash action game. There are only two classes available, but the branched talent tree allows you to create different sets of skills that can and even need to be combined with partner talents to more effectively destroy opponents.
If there are no friends, then the game can be played alone.
Inkulinati
Genre: Strategy, RPG
Date of: January 31
Platform: PC (Early Access), Xbox One, Xbox Series X
An ink-stepping strategy game whose visual style refers to medieval manuscripts and the name to the Illuminati order. The player will have to take control of one of the Inculinati (Cherniluminata) and become the best among the best in this strict game filled with humor and grotesque.
Inkulinati is the first project of the Polish studio Yaza Games and if you doubt that the game has anything more to offer than an interesting visual style, a demo is already available on Steam.
