At Gamescom I sat down with a lovely ice cold beer and two lovely lads who ran me through military real-time tactics sequel Men Of War II in a 45-minute hands-off presentation. As a total freshman to the series, I was a little intimidated by the prospect of sinking my feet into the trenches of a dense strategy bonanza, especially as things kicked off with a literal history lesson.

But after watching and absorbing one of the game's early missions, I can genuinely say that I'd be confident enough to give it a go when it comes out. Even perhaps, confident enough to say that I'd genuinely enjoy it quite a bit as a total newbie.

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Oh my goodness, what a creepy, funny, and odd> game Northern Journey is. I almost don't want to say any more about it, not because it can be spoiled but because it seems appropriately respectful. Not in a reverent sense, you understand. It just feels like such a world should be preserved, even slightly feared, rather than trampled on by some idiot with a camera in her face.

To call Northern Journey "retro" would completely misrepresent it. It's beautiful in an ugly, desolate way reminiscent of Kenshi or Morrowind. It's translucent in its exposition but not obtuse, hostile, or obnoxiously hard. It's a bit clunky, without that ever undermining the experience. It's vaguely amateurish, yet almost consciously so, like a painter who knows their talent and intent is enough to overcome any technical flaws. This is a bloody treat and I'm so glad I got to play it.

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First impressions can be interesting. I didn’t know what to expect when I met David Ventura at the Backbeat booth, after a long opening day of the weekend-long Japanese indie gaming event BitSummit. I knew of his work - now the CEO of his self-founded studio Ichigoichie with developers based both in Japan and Sweden, Ventura has had his hands in a number of highly-influential rhythm games over the course of his career. This includes work on Gitaroo Man and Elite Beat Agents during his time in Japan at iNiS, having worked at the studio for a decade before moving to Sweden to work outside of games on educational music software. In 2018 he returned to games by founding Ichigoichie (stylised as 151A). Their first game, Hexagroove, blended strategy, rhythm and educational tools for a game that captured the building blocks of being a DJ.

Ventura was at BitSummit to showcase the successor to this game, Backbeat. It’s a bit of a departure from much of his past work, acting more like a puzzle game with a musical soul, albeit one where the act of creating and playing music together is imbued into every solution. As the crowd began to leave the bustling convention hall for the day, I went to the booth for one last demo, and the chance to speak to the person behind it all… who was sat at his demo kiosk playing the keytar.

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Inti Creates have earned themselves a reputation in recent years, through titles like Blaster Master Zero and the Azure Striker Gunvolt series, of creating visually-intricate and technical 2D platformers. Their games scratch the nostalgic itch while not reverting to the technical problems and gameplay hurdles that we’ve long since moved beyond. Part of what makes Gunvolt appealing is that it refines and expands upon a formula we see in the Mega Man X series, and it’s a similar intent that defines the company’s approach to their latest project, Grim Guardians: Demon Purge.

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As indie developers from Japan and around the world descended upon the former Japanese capital of Kyoto for Bitsummit 2022, some developers present at the event were showcasing their games a little closer to home. Having already been hyped up amongst Japanese games outlets for its unique visuals and inspirations from Japanese yokai and folk tales, Kitsune: The Journey Of Adashino was a rather hot ticket at the event, and with an English localisation and a release in 2023 or 2024 planned, it stands with the opportunity to shine a light on the Japanese indie gaming scene.

While it may perhaps be reductive to make a Studio Ghibli comparison to the game’s opening moments, the familiarity many have with those films compared to Japanese folklore makes the equivalence an easy one. My time with the demo was from a moment early in the game, when you’ve already set foot into this new world but don't have much knowledge about the yokai-infested supernatural surprises that await you.

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There are a ton of Blue Microphones on sale at Amazon UK at the moment, as part of their 'gaming week' promotion. As well as the Yeti and Snowball USB microphones that are most likely to be familiar to you, there's also a rare 42% discount on the Blue Blackout Spark XLR mic - nice.

However, the microphones I'd like to focus on today are those popular options, specifically the Blue Snowball Ice and the Blue Yeti X. These represent the top and the bottom of the Blue spectrum when it comes to gaming-friendly USB mics.

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Did you know you can get a 32GB kit of 6000MT/s DDR5 RAM and> a 2TB NVMe PCIe 4.0 SSD for £235 at CCL? That's an awesome deal on a normally £500 bundle that gives you some of the most critical components for a new high-spec Intel 12th-gen system.

To get the deal, follow the link below to the TeamGroup Delta DDR5-6000 RAM. Add this to your cart, and you'll see that the TeamGroup Cardea Z44Q 2TB NVMe SSD is added for free as well. To reduce the price further, use code AFF15 at the checkout.

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Back at Geoff Fest, I spoke with Glenn Schofield about The Callisto Protocol, its gore system, spiky walls, and batteries. From what I'd seen and heard, I was keen to see more of the sci-fi horror game that's not Dead Space but is also quite like Dead Space.

So, at this year's Geoffscom I was able to see a 20-minute presentation of some new Callisto goodness and then chat with Striking Distance Studios' chief technology officer Mark James about what I'd seen. We touched on dismemberment, 3D printers, and Shaun Of The Dead, naturally.

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Last week HyperX announced their first-ever gaming monitors, the Armada 25 and Armada 27, and within a couple of days I was being led into their Gamescom booth to try each of them for myself. After a disappointingly uncomfortable preview of the Samsung Odyssey Ark, it was nice to get to grips with a far more utilitarian pair of monitors – albeit not without a party trick of their own, namely HyperX’s Armada Gaming Mount.

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Standing on the shoulders of giants (Brendy and Pip and everyone else who did the podcast before us) means we have reached episode 200 of The Electronic Show podcast! Wowzer! Thanks for being with us for this record-breaking feat. We asked for suggestions and received many excellent ones, but in the end we went with a suggestion from Jonathon which, at the time we recorded, I did not realise would be instantly revealed by the episode title. Cheers to you all!

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