April’s pretty thin as far as new game releases go. So we at Kotaku are taking the moment to focus on something shared among every gamer: a backlog. You could call it a month...about backlogs…surely there’s some sort of cutesy phrase we could use? Aha! Backlog Month!
Look, it’s not like April is literally devoid of game releases. Last week, Outriders came in hot. At the end of the month, Switch players will be able to pick up Pokémon Snap—a revival of the game series about taking pictures of Pokémon—while PlayStation 5 players will get Returnal, a bullet-hell roguelike from the makers of Resogun. The weeks between feature a smattering of other releases: Cozy Grove, Oddworld: Soulstorm, Nier Replicant, some baseball game. But still, April’s looking like the perfect time to chip away at the ol’ backlog.
I’ve already gotten started: January’s Hitman 3 opened my eyes to how staggeringly terrific Hitman is, so I’m currently playing through the World of Assassination trilogy. I recently started Nioh 2. It’s hard! I’d like to play enough to the point where it’s not so hard. Both DLC chapters of Doom Eternal are out, so I need to give those a whirl. Same for the new Immortals Fenyx Rising expansion, and the new Outer Worlds one, and the old Outer Worlds one. Oh, and I finally need to finish Bravely Default 2 for real, an otherwise terrific role-playing game that apparently has 8,000 endings.
Throughout the month, expect to see a lot of chatter from Kotaku’s staff about games we’re trying out for the first time, playing again, or just finally getting a chance to write about. That’ll keep us busy until May, which is shaping up to be one of the more stacked months of the year, with games like Biomutant, Deathloop, Resident Evil Village, and the much-anticipated launch of Mass Effect: Legendary Edition on the horizon. Y’know, unless any of those get delayed in the 11th hour, like so many other games this year.
Read all of our Backlog Month articles here.