Sony kicked off its annual Days of Play celebration (now in its eighth year) with a rapid-fire, 14-game showcase on Thursday teasing a great range of games, first-party and third, coming to its consoles as well as PC later this year or in 2025.
If you couldn’t tune in for the Thursday evening festivities, here’s a recap of each trailer shown.
Concord
A year after its original announcement at the 2023 PlayStation Showcase, now we know more of what Concord is about. In terms of gameplay, it’s a hero shooter. As a story, it seems greatly derivative of Guardians of the Galaxy. There’s the wise-ass improvising leader, his down-to-earth female co-lead, a pure-muscle character who speaks in simple declarative sentences, and a non-human support robot with amazing abilities, all of whom dress their over-the-top action with pithy, ironic asides.
Concord also got a gameplay trailer (which didn’t air during State of Play) after the broadcast, too:
God of War Ragnarok
The widely acclaimed 2022 action-adventure for PlayStation 4 and PlayStation 5 will, as long suspected, come to PC on Sept. 19. It’s part of a steady march of PlayStation exclusive prestige titles to PC, which includes Death Stranding, Ghost of Tsushima, Days Gone, The Last of Us Part I, and Ratchet & Clank: Rift Apart.
Monster Hunter Wilds
The sequel to 2018’s smash success Monster Hunter: World will launch in 2025. Capcom lent Sony a big three-minute gameplay trailer showing what players can expect when the series returns. (Spoiler alert: Monsters, plus hunting them.)
Silent Hill 2 Remake
Hey, look at that, Konami’s back to being interested in making video games people love from its deep library of award winning IPs. Silent Hill 2, developed by Bloober Team, is coming to PlayStation 5 Oct. 8, 2024, and here’s what folks can expect.
Path of Exile 2
This sequel to Grinding Gear Games’ free-to-play action RPG (think: Diablo) is coming to PlayStation 5 and PC in early access in “late 2024.” The big difference? Couch co-op, for those gracious enough to share the loot.
Astro Bot
As expected, the lovable robot buddy who onboarded PlayStation fans to their VR headsets in 2018, and the new DualSense controller in 2020, finally gets his own show with Astro Bot. It looks like a proper platforming adventure (with a little bit of racing thrown in). Slowly but surely, Team Asobi’s delightful little android is working his way to official PlayStation mascot status, especially if this adventure is half as fun as it looks.
Marvel Rivals
The one big spanner in Concord’s works could be Marvel Rivals, a licensed hero shooter drawing from that comic book universe, currently in cloud testing on PC. A closed beta for PlayStation 5 begins in July for those looking to play with gamepads on a console.
Alien: Rogue Incursion
This is for PlayStation VR 2 only but, you know what, that’s probably the best medium for what looks like an intense piece of survival horror. The Alien franchise has done its best, as a video game, when it’s delivered the hunted-vs.-hunters chills and thrills of the original film, a la 2014’s Alien: Isolation. In virtual reality, the ride should be even more frightening.
Dynasty Warriors: Origins
This will be the first mainline entry in the 25-year-old Dynasty Warriors franchise since 2018’s Dynasty Warriors 9. From this trailer, fans can expect more of the same: One against hundreds, and button-mashing, hacking-and-slashing action abounds. Dynasty Warriors: Origins will also launch on Windows PC and Xbox Series X. The game arrives in 2025.
Until Dawn (remastered)
Somewhat butting heads with Silent Hill 2’s remake is remastered Until Dawn, another survival horror narrative featuring jump scares and people continually making bad decisions that trigger more jump scares. Until Dawn first launched in 2015 on PlayStation 4.
Infinity Nikki
It’s hard to put a label on this game, as it appears to be a mixture of cozycore role-playing with a lot of dress-up options and cute mascots. In either case, it’s a very pretty game, with a beta test coming this fall.
Ballad of Antara
Back on task, here’s a harder-edge, apparently Soulslike adventure from TipWorks Studio coming sometime in 2025. Per the official YouTube page: “A faraway land is on the verge of being lost to a conflict from eons ago, and the invasion that followed it. Embark on a perilous journey, seek towering divine creatures, to reclaim the twisted and lost fundamentals of the world.”
Where Winds Meet
Hats off if you remember this game’s original reveal, during Opening Night Live at Gamescom 2022. We’ve heard little from it since, but Where Winds Meet is a wuxia (martial arts and chivalry, in the Chinese tradition) open-world action-RPG from Everstone Studios.
Behemoth
Coming from Skydance, Behemoth is a VR-only adventure arriving later in 2024. It looks like an against-all-odds fight against huge monsters and beasts, at least the last, final boss, for sure.