New Releases: February 1st-7th, 2024

This week, Granblue Fantasy: Relink delivers character-driven role-playing action, Persona 3 Reload lets us recultivate those social links, while Jujutsu Kaisen Cursed Clash brings sorcerers together for some two-on-two fighting. If none of those interest you, KONOSUBA – God’s Blessing on this Wonderful World! Love For These Clothes of Desire! (pictured) lands on PC this week, with PlayStation and Switch versions arriving next Thursday.

PlayStation 4
Alisa Developer’s Cut (digital, $17.99)
Foamstars (digital, $29.99)
Granblue Fantasy: Relink (physical & digital, $59.99)
Jujutsu Kaisen Cursed Clash (physical & digital, $59.99)
Persona 3 Reload (physical & digital, $69.99)
Piggy Gambit (digital, $6.99)

PlayStation 5
Granblue Fantasy: Relink (physical & digital, $59.99)
Jujutsu Kaisen Cursed Clash (physical & digital, $59.99)
Persona 3 Reload (physical & digital, $69.99)
Suicide Squad: Kill the Justice League (physical & digital, $69.99)

Switch
Alisa Developer’s Cut (digital, $17.99)
ASMR Slicing: Nice Cuts Edition (digital, $5.99)
Candy Shake Cup (digital, $3.59)
Ceiba (digital, $9.99)
CLeM (digital, $15.99)
Cooking Arena – 3 in 1 Edition
Defense Master (digital, $14.99)
DIY Paper Doll: Classy Edition (digital, $5.99)
Drawing Carnival: Anime Edition (digital, $5.99)
Dr. Frank’s Build a Boyfriend (digital, $4.99)
Dreamcutter (digital, $14.99)
Dungeonoid 2 Awakening (digital, $8.99)
Farm Day Simulator 2024 (digital, $9.99)
Harpoon Shooter! Nozomi (digital, $9.98)
HunterX: Code Name T (digital, $11.89)
Japanese Escape Games The Police Office (digital, $4.99)
Johnny Trigger: Butcher Edition (digital, $7.99)
Jujutsu Kaisen Cursed Clash (digital, $59.99-$99.99)
Knights of Braveland (digital, $17.99)
Morto – Chapter 2 (digital, $0.98)
Piggy Gambit (digital, $6.99)
Postal: Brain Damaged (digital, $22.49)
Project Downfall (digital, $23.99)
Snow Moto (digital, $12.99)
Sweet Bakery Tycoon Complete Edition (digital, $6.99)
Teppo and The Secret Ancient City (digital, $7.99)
The Pigeon – Simulator (digital, $12.99)
Torn Away (digital, $15.00)
Town Adventures (digital, $7.99)
UDO: Unidentified Drilling Object (digital, $14.99)

Xbox One
Cannibal Abduction (digital, $11.99)
Ginsha (digital, $16.19)
Jujutsu Kaisen Cursed Clash (physical & digital, $59.99-$99.99)
Knights of Braveland (digital, $17.99)
Mighty Aphid 2 (digital, $4.99)
Persona 3 Reload (physical & digital, $69.99)
Project Downfall (digital, $15.99)
Suicide Squad: Kill the Justice League (physical & digital, $69.99)
Sydney Hunter and the Curse of the Mayan (digital, $9.99)

PC
Boxes: Lost Fragments ($13.49)
Granblue Fantasy: Relink ($59.99)
Jujutsu Kaisen Cursed Clash ($59.99)
KONOSUBA – God’s Blessing on this Wonderful World! Love For These Clothes of Desire! ($49.99)
Legendary Hoplite ($TBA)
Persona 3 Reload ($69.99)
Suicide Squad: Kill the Justice League ($69.99)
Tales of Spark ($TBA)
Touhou Danmaku Kagura Phantasia Lost ($TBA)
WitchHand ($TBA)

Rob’s Pick: Undoubtedly, Persona 3 is a groundbreaking role-playing game. From writing that portrayed characters with sophistication, Shoji Meguro’s emotive and heavily vocalized soundtrack, to the integration of social bonds, Atlus delivered a wonderfully rich experience. But these days, Atlus seems to be testing how much people will pay for their titles, between the $70 MSRP for Persona 3 Reload and the $15 New Game+ fiasco with Infinite Wealth. I’m sure I’ll eventually pick up the remake for the visual upgrade and tweaks to battle mechanics, but only once there’s a healthy drop in price.

Instead, Granblue Fantasy: Relink gets the nod. Technically, the game arrived late on January 31^st, but I won’t let a few hours stand in the way of recommending their solid action-RPG, especially for teams of cooperative players. Although Platinum Games’ development assistance dropped a few years ago, you can feel some of their influence as you make your way through Sky Realm.

Ryan’s pick: Exploooosion! The KONOSUBA series has ceased to crack me up in terms of all the quirky characters and at times low-brow humor. This show really helped carve out something special right when isekai style anime were becoming mainstream. While KONOSUBA – God’s Blessing on this Wonderful World! Love For These Clothes Of Desire! doesn’t appear to be too graphically intensive, I still think I’m going to enjoy it as it appears to be a mix of visual novel and light crafting elements. Fingers crossed for cameos from some of the other secondary characters like Yun Yun or Wiz.

Granblue Fantasy: Relink also got my attention because I’ve always been interested in the series but time-wise I am just not able to pick up another gacha right now. While this game features many of the characters from the series, it is not a gacha-style game, so you can unlock various characters by progressing through the game. The series has a wealth of characters to choose from after about 10 years of the gacha game running, so you may just find a waifu or husbando to add to your tier list with this one.

Matt S’ pick (editor, DigitallyDownloaded): Granblue Fantasy has the potential to be a contender for the very top echelon of JRPGs, based on Relink. This game so spectacularly breaks out from the mobile base to offer something with excellent, snappy action, a solid narrative, and some exceptional production values. Especially the girls. Oh lord are the girls in this game gorgeous…

Ahem. The point is, I was surprised and impressed by Relink. Don’t sleep on it. If Cygames is encouraged by the response to it, perhaps we’ll get a few more, and before we know it, we’ll have an action JRPG series that gives Ys and Tales a real run for their money.  The remake of Persona 3 is also very worthy, with aesthetics of the same standard as Persona 5, but the dark, brooding narrative is kept intact.