Swansong is a role-playing game that delivers the entirety of its drama through dialogue–there is no combat to speak of. Critical scenes between characters are resolved within conversational set-pieces called "confrontations." RPGs can exist without traditional battles--just look at Disco Elysium, for example--but the dialogue now thrust center-stage needs to sing, or at least harmonize with a deep skill system. Swansong, sadly, delivers neither. Its writing is pedestrian, often incoherent, and its supporting systems are underutilized, adding little flavor to distinguish the three playable characters.

You play as three vampires--Emem, Galeb, and Leysha--summoned to a crisis meeting at Boston's vampire HQ, after a party to mark an alliance with the Hartford Chantry (a sect of blood sorcerers) ends in a bloodbath, and not the good kind. The local vampire prince instructs the trio to uncover what happened and eventually sends them on a series of overlapping missions of revenge. Missions are tailored to each vampire's specific abilities, and you'll play as each character in turn. For the first half of the game, you'll decide the order in which to tackle the missions, giving you some choice to pursue the storyline that's of most interest. But over the second half, a more linear approach takes over, and you find yourself shunted from one character's mission to the next, each ending on something of a cliffhanger.

Horror fans are living in a golden age. It seems like a few major horror franchises are adapted into games every year, most often in the asymmetrical multiplayer genre. Casting a group of friends as hapless survivors against another player hunting them as a supernatural foe is a great idea on paper every time, even as end results can dramatically vary. Evil Dead: The Game doesn't stray far from this foundational premise. However, it smartly leans on its B-movie hijinx to deliver fans something worthy of being in their horror game rotation, even if it doesn't have the soul to swallow all of their time single-handedly.

While Evil Dead: The Game is its official title, you could rightly call it Fan Service: The Game instead. Drawing from the original three movies and the Starz series--sorry, reboot fans--Evil Dead beams with pride and fandom from its developers, collecting all manner of weapons, Easter eggs, locations, and corny one-liners that made the series famous. Original actors are brought back in most cases, including the all-important Bruce Campbell, whose many versions of Ash Williams make up a good portion of the character roster.

Wandering across the game's several large maps can feel like a museum tour through one of horror's cult-favorite franchises. The audio and visuals lend themselves to this glowing first impression, too. Music straight from the series and faithful character models--including the nauseatingly detailed Deadites--makes Evil Dead: The Game feel as lovingly crafted as the movies.

After the success of 2016's Salt and Sanctuary, indie developer Ska Studios could've rested on its laurels when designing a sequel to the 2D Souls-like. Instead, the two-person studio has done the opposite, pulling from an amalgamation of influences to create a game that differs vastly from its predecessor. Salt and Sacrifice isn't just another 2D Souls-like; it still retains many of the genre's fundamentals, yet its allusions to Metroidvania and, crucially, Monster Hunter, are much more pronounced. While it does feature satisfying combat and progression, many of its risks don't always pay off and this curious concoction falls just short of realizing its full potential.

Salt and Sacrifice casts you as a condemned prisoner in a kingdom corrupted by malignant magic. Monstrous creatures now roam the lands, with the source of all this defilement tracing back to the nefarious Mages who now stalk each region. Given the option of either execution or a life of Mage-hunting, you choose the latter, becoming a Marked Inquisitor sent to track down these dangerous Mages and devour their hearts to ensure the kingdom survives. After creating a character and getting routinely demolished by an overpowered boss in true Souls-like fashion, you awaken in Pardoner's Vale, a hub area where you can converse with various NPCs, level up your character class, craft and upgrade new weapons and armor, and pet an adorable cat with antlers.

A while back, the minds behind the beloved Suikoden RPG series set up a Kickstarter to fund Eiyuden Chronicle, a classically styled JRPG currently set for a 2023 release. However, one of the stretch goals was for a "companion game," meant to help introduce players to the world and its characters while the flagship title was being developed. Enter Eiyuden Chronicle: Rising, a 2.5D, side-scrolling, exploration-action game with light RPG and town-building elements. While it might not be the big game that fans and Kickstarter backers are eagerly anticipating, there's enough to Rising to make it worth a look.

RiffTrax is the successful version of your favorite pastime: hanging out with your friends and making fun of bad movies. Combining that with the party-game genre, which has largely been dominated primarily by Jackbox Games, makes sense. RiffTrax: The Game allows players to write their own comedic lines to accompany clips from bad movies. Are you and your friends witty or do you rely primarily on the fallback of making a robot voice say "f***" and "shit" to get your laughs?

RiffTrax: The Game is essentially a spiritual successor to developer Wide Right Interactive's What The Dub but with the added voiceover work and witty writing of the RiffTrax crew: Michael J. Nelson, Kevin Murphy, and Bill Corbett. You may also know these voices from the '90s TV show Mystery Science Theater 3000 as Mike Nelson, the second Tom Servo, and the second Crow, respectively. The multiplayer party game features over 250 movie clips, many of which come from RiffTrax classics fans will be familiar with like Plan 9 From Outer Space, and allows for 1-6 players to participate, in addition to audience members who can watch and vote for their favorite jokes.

Much like RiffTrax and MST3K, the goal of this game is to make jokes while clips from bad movies play. Much like the various Jackbox games, this is a game to play at parties, and participating only requires a phone, tablet, or even a desktop, so it's available to everyone with an internet browser. While the overall goal of getting the biggest laughs remains the same, there are two modes of play for RiffTrax: The Game: Pick a Riff, where you choose from a small list of pre-written lines, read by the RiffTrax team, and Write A Riff, where you create your own funny lines. Points are tabulated throughout the game, and the winner at the end is the person with the highest score. If you've ever played one of the many Jackbox games, you're familiar with this format.