Our Thoughts On Clair Obscur: Expedition 33, The Marathon Alpha, The Hundred Line, And More Of The Week’s Top Takes

Screenshot: Sandfall Interactive, Too Kyo Games / Kotaku, Wadjet Eye Games / Kotaku, Double Fine / Kotaku, OpenMW / Bethesda / Kotaku, Image: Bungie

This week we spent some time with the Marathon alpha and tell you what we loved and hated about Bungie’s upcoming extraction shooter. We also found ourselves seduced by Clair Obscur: Expedition 33, smitten with the new time-travel-themed point-and-click adventure Old Skies, and impressed with The Hundred Line, the new collaboration between the makers of Danganronpa and Zero Escape. Read on for these opinions and more.

Image: Ian Gavan

If you have a functioning Xbox Series X and a GameStop membership, the meme stock retailer will give you “up to” $420.69 in store credit for the four-year old console. The week-long trade-in deal is an April 20 shitpost but also very real and possibly the best deal available for anyone currently looking to hop off the Xbox Series X train amid boycotts and a new multiplatform push that’s seen some of its biggest exclusives ported to PlayStation 5. – Ethan Gach Read More

Screenshot: Sandfall Interactive

I’ve put about 15 hours into Clair Obscur: Expedition 33, and my conclusion so far is that developer Sandfall Interactive might be cooking. The French RPG is clearly inspired by the Japanese greats like Final Fantasy and Persona, but its Paper Mario-style timing elements and wealth of original mechanics keep its grind engaging and decidedly modern. My time with the game hasn’t been without frustrations, but I’m writing these impressions wishing I could be playing the game instead. That’s gotta count for something. – Kenneth Shepard Read More

Screenshot: Too Kyo Games / Kotaku

When Danganronpa creator Kazutaka Kodaka and Zero Escape director Kotaro Uchikoshi joined forces to found Too Kyo Games in 2017, I was curious to see just what the two legends of so-called “death games” would create together. But although the team has put out several games in just under a decade, none of them have quite felt like a collaborative effort bearing the distinct creative fingerprints of both creators, until now. The Hundred Line: Last Defense Academy may not be a death game like the duo’s previous work, but the tactical RPG is still overflowing with both Kodaka and Uchikoshi’s signature twists, turns, over-the-top characters, and bold design elements that have made each of their works memorable. – Kenneth Shepard Read More

Image: Bungie

Marathon is out in less than six months and there’s still a lot we don’t know about it. But thanks to the current closed alpha, we’ve had a chance to finally go hands-on with Bungie’s first new project in over a decade and the latest live-service game coming out of the PlayStation portfolio. The results so far have left us scratching out heads. – Zack Zwiezen Read More

Screenshot: Wadjet Eye Games / Kotaku

Seven years ago, Wadjet Eye Games released Unavowed, a point-and-click adventure that took the industry by surprise. Incorporating ideas from BioWare RPGs, this was a game in which the companions you took with you for any mission changed not only how the puzzles were solved, but how the story was told. It was magnificent, and received wide acclaim. Wadjet Eye’s follow-up game, some seven years later, is Old Skies, and while its structure takes a more traditional shape, it’s a boldly ambitious, constantly inventive piece of masterful storytelling. – John Walker Read More

Screenshot: Double Fine / Kotaku

One of the stranger moments of my career was reviewing a game, giving it a four-page review and a well-deserved score of 89 percent in the then-massively-selling UK PC Gamer magazine, and then the game not coming out for another eight months. That was just one example of the nightmares Psychonauts—Double Fine’s magnum opus—went through on its path to becoming one of the most beloved games of all time. It’s now 20 years since its official U.S. release, and that deserves celebration. – John Walker Read More

Screenshot: OpenMW / Bethesda / Kotaku

Having booted up the original Oblivion only a week or so ago and realizing just how playable that 20-year-old game still is out of the box despite the recent release of an official remaster, it got me wondering about earlier Elder Scrolls games. Can I just load up Morrowind and play that too? The answer is: sort of. But there’s another option that’s so much better. – John Walker Read More

Why People Are Rushing To Sell Their Xbox Series X To GameStop Right Now

GameStop is promising $420.69 for old Microsoft consoles