PAX East 2024 had many eye-catching games to play. But some of them took genres and dug their own niche into them. Through developer creativity and sheer fun, these games stood out as the most fun and interesting ones you should wishlist immediately.
The Lullaby of Life
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At first, The Lullaby of Life seems like a simple chill game. You’re a little amoeba-like creature floating around a colorful and musical world for the most part. Its fun comes from its puzzles, though. You slowly unlock new musical tools to help you on your adventure. Each has to be used in rhythm or in tandem with others at your disposal to unlock gates, solve puzzles, or avoid obstacles. Use one out of order, and you’ll be set back a little bit to reset. Even barriers will sometimes pop up to stop the soundwaves from hitting their target, creating an interesting layer of complexity.
That’s all before touching just how soothing the music is. This is a game that, once released, can easily be on a “top five games to vibe out to” list. With how well the musical mechanics don’t seem to conflict with the background music, you create a symphony that works well to create one cohesive unit. And like any musical-based puzzle game, messing up hurts because you’re interrupting a zen flow.
The Lullaby of Life is coming to Steam on April 30th, 2024.
Touhou Mystia’s Izakaya
If you like management sims and graphic novels, you’ll love Touhou Mystia’s Izakaya. You’re running an izakaya in the magical realm with a mix of these elements. Numerous demigods come to feed at your restaurant, and you’re just building it up with hand-picked ingredients from around the area. While the graphic novel aspect is a major portion, the time management for resource collection is also a shockingly important part of the game, too. See, you’re not just judged on how well you run the izakaya. You’re also judged on how many good quality ingredients you can collect to make all the meals for the restaurant. Plus, this is all packaged with an adorable art style to pull you into the world.
Touhou Mystia’s Izakaya is coming to Nintendo Switch on May 2nd, 2024 and is available now on Steam.
Deathbound
Souls-likes has to be one of the most varied genres out there just by the sheer amount of ways developers have found to mix up the formula for any number of interesting settings. Deathbound is no exception. This brings the soulslike genre to a modern post-apocalyptic setting where nobody can die. As such, the decaying modern world is full of medieval weaponry and two factions fighting for control. One wants to see an end to the deathless world, and the other wants to see life live on.
What makes this twist great is the character you control. Your character has the power to switch souls on the fly. You can switch from a ranged damage dealer to a stealthy rogue to a noble paladin whenever possible. Even mid-combat. Even better, mid-combo. The four souls you have selected act as four parts of the same whole. As one tires out, switching to another lets you keep going and recharge the weary faster. Damage is shared in a way between all four as well. If one character dies, you’re not completely dead. It’s game over only if all four die. So this creates a genuinely exciting balancing act of switching between your four selected characters, who interact with the world differently to conquer the deathless world.
Deathbound will be coming to Steam in 2024.
Tarnished Blood
Many RPGs have taken time mechanics and tried to add them to different turn-based combat mechanics. Tarnished Blood takes all that to a whole new level. Instead of being able to manipulate character orders or reverse or fast forward time, you control the timeline of events. This means that on a battlefield, you’re moving four characters around to try and counteract or avoid damage while trying to deal damage. Tarnished Blood is fantastic in just how responsive it is. Moving a character comes down to precise angles and timing on the timeline. As you select something, you’ll quickly see just how the battlefield changes. A boss attack could be coming, and jumping at the right moment will lead to them avoiding damage and lining up to land a massive attack.
Controlling four characters while doing this can be overwhelming. It quickly becomes a balancing act, determining who is most important to avoid damage or who can act fast enough to deflect an attack. The timeline accounts for numerous aspects that you may not always consider, like the time it takes to actually leap and the time to land. As you confirm the commands, parts of the timeline lock in place. So there isn’t a sense of urgency; your choices just matter before you lock it all. And nothing is more satisfying than seeing everything play out after getting the kill to see how exactly you pulled off the impossible.
Tarnished Blood is coming to Steam in 2024.
Dustborn
Dustborn may be one of the most stylish games on the PAX East show floor. Taking place in an alternate timeline where Jackie Kennedy died instead of her husband, President JFK basically locked down the country. In her death’s wake, mechanical police bots roam the streets, four different countries have evolved from the USA, and some people have gained powers, or vox, but are almost second-class citizens called Anomals. You play as Pax and her “band” as they go on a road trip from Pacifica (formerly California) to the East Coast for a safe haven.
The brief glimpse of their journey shows how rad it is. Full of beating-up police bots and rocking out to great punk music is set up to be an awesome road trip adventure. It’s also full of narrative choices, too, that build Pax and her crew to be how you want them to be. The choices we had to make on the show floor all revolved around Pax’s sister and how we could help her become a better person. We couldn’t see just how this affects the grander journey, but it was clear that there were some minor differences in how the scene played out depending on what you chose. The best part? It’s all in the style of a comic book.
Dustborn is coming to Steam and consoles on August 20, 2024.
Silent Slayer: Vault of the Vampire
Horror games and VR are a dangerous combination, especially when you are dealing with slaying vampires. Silent Slayer: Vault of the Vampire takes horror games and adds puzzles to them to slay numerous fanged foes. You see, you’re a vampire hunter killing vampires before they wake up. And to do that, you need to slowly and quietly open their coffins. For the most part, this game isn’t terrifying like many other VR horror titles are. But if you mess up enough, like if you drop a nail, pull a bar too quickly, or drop a tool, you will get jumpscared very quickly. Plus, it’s just really satisfying to stab a vampire with a stake after getting everything right.
Silent Slayer: Vault of the Vampire is coming to Meta Quest Summer 2024.
Slime Heroes
Another game akin to souls-likes, Slime Heroes takes the genre in a more chill direction. In Slime Heroes, you play as a slime on a quest to cleanse the world. Its souls-like elements are much more subtle than others, where if you die, you lose resources. Thankfully, they are easy to pick up and pick back up. This game’s world is also bright and beautiful, which contrasts well with its dark enemies. Not only is its selling point being you play as a cute slime, it’s also how you use the slime’s abilities to your advantage. Slimes are easily adaptable and can gain new abilities from vanquished foes. Those abilities can mix together to create newer, stronger abilities. Like combining two tornado skills creates a much stronger one. Or combining a tornado and a bullet skill lets you shoot tornadoes at enemies in the distance. Then you can tack on elements to cause devastation wherever you go.
There are also secrets galore throughout the two areas that could be checked out on the show floor. From battle arenas to challenge rooms that push your skills with a specific ability to the limit for great rewards, every NPC interaction is great, and all build this world of lost heroes needing to come together to cleanse the planet. So, if you’re looking for a hack-and-slash adventure with soul-like elements, look no further than Slime Heroes.
Slime Heroes is coming to Steam and Xbox Series X|S soon.
Haunted House Renovator
Haunted House Renovator is one of the most unique renovation games that may exist. It takes that simulator genre and adds a fun twist, you’re paranormally cleaning up houses. How does this work? On top of your normal responsibilities of renovating, like cleaning floors, repairing furniture, painting walls, etc., you also need to handle ghosts and otherworldly creatures in specific ways while they get in your own way. Ghosts can mess rooms back up, destroy furniture, or just bother you. They’re never harmful, just nuisances. And the way you have to find how exactly to stop ghosts from being annoying adds its own twist to every room and every map.
Haunted House Renovator is coming to Steam soon.
Check out all these games and more from PAX East 2024.
