Clockwork Revolution

inXile Entertainment, the developer behind the Wasteland series is entering uncharted territory with its next project Clockwork Revolution. It’s an upcoming first-person shooter that thrusts you into the steampunk realm of Avalon where you have to travel back in time through the use of special abilities to reshape reality through your decisions. Clockwork Revolution features some impressive art direction, and the gameplay is all about juggling between your weapons and special abilities to take on different challenges. It’s heavily inspired by Prey, and might just end up being a great time if it stands true to its promises. It comes out for PC and Xbox Series X/S sometime in the near future.

Suicide Squad: Kill The Justice League

Rocksteady has been hard at work on Suicide Squad: Kill The Justice League, and it will be released for current-gen consoles and PCs on February 2. It tells the story of how Brainiac has hijacked the minds of the members of the Justice League, and how the ragtag group of anti-heroes i.e. Suicide Squad rises up to the occasion to save the day. The gameplay is pretty simplistic with players having to shoot down waves upon waves of enemies all while jumping around the open-world of Metropolis. There is quite a bit of skepticism with regard to its seemingly repetitive gameplay, but it just might be a fun time with friends through the co-op mode.

Destiny 2: The Final Shape

Destiny 2 has been growing strong with each passing expansion, and Bungie is set to bring the Light and Darkness saga to an end with The Final Shape expansion. Set in an entirely new region, The Final Shape expansion will pit players against a new evil force namely the Subjugators. Of course, there’s going to be plenty of new loot to look forward to – and the developers have also confirmed that all classes will receive a new Super Ability with this pack. It comes out on 4 June 2024 for PC and consoles.

S.T.A.L.K.E.R. 2: Heart of Chornobyl

Set against the backdrop of the Chornobyl Exclusion Zone, S.T.A.L.K.E.R. 2: Heart of Chornobyl is primed to bring the classic open-world survival sandbox gameplay to a brand new set audience. The trailers have showcased a well-realized post-apocalyptic world brimming with all sorts of human and inhuman threats alongside some great use of Unreal Engine 5, so S.T.A.L.K.E.R. 2 has plenty of great stuff to look forward to. GSC Game World has been working on this sequel for a long time, and it releases for PC and Xbox Series X/S consoles on 5 September 2024.

Exe Killer

Paradark Studio’s upcoming Exe Killer might just have one of the most unique settings for a first-person shooter. It thrusts players into an alternate post-apocalyptic reality that combines a futuristic dystopia with the Wild West, and the story revolves around the bounty-hunting adventures of our protagonist. There’s quite a bit of shooting involved in the gameplay, but Exe Killer also infuses open-world mechanics and driving to craft a compelling experience. Exe Killer releases for PC sometime in 2025.

SCP: EVENT CLASSIFIED

Set against the backdrop of a mysterious facility, SCP: Event Classified lets you choose between the role of a soldier, a prisoner, a scientist, or a monster with differing goals for each of these characters. SCP: Event Classified is a horror shooter with some interesting atmosphere and gameplay variety, and it also claims to be highly replayable thanks to procedural map generation and varied objectives. It comes out for PC sometime in Q2 2024.

IGI Origins

The I.G.I. series is making a grand return with I.G.I. Origins which looks like everything that fans would want out of such a sequel right from a military conflict setting to espionage-styled missions and a gameplay loop that mixes stealth and action in just the right proportions. It’s being built using Unreal Engine 5, and suffice it to say it looks really beautiful with realistic lighting and quality textures. It will come out on PC sometime in the near future.

Ripout (console release)

Pet Project Games has made its grand debut with Ripout, a first-person shooter set in outer space. It looks pretty standard affair at first glance, but it has quite a few tricks up its sleeve ranging from procedurally generated levels to a pet gun companion and regenerating monsters that help it stand out from the crowd. It was released last year for PC to some great reviews, and is en route for a console port that will come out in the near future.

Mouse

Yet another beautifully unconventional-looking game, Mouse combines a noir story with an art style that’s heavily inspired by hand-drawn cartoons, and it looks amazing to say the least. The gameplay revolves around shooting down your enemies to the tune of jazz music, and the immaculate art direction that we see in the trailer is what makes it all so compelling in the first place. Mouse will be released for PC, Xbox consoles, and Nintendo Switch.

Outpost: Infinity Siege

Outpost: Infinity Siege is a really interesting game because it combines two very contrasting genres into a single gameplay loop, and that too in a way that it all feels weirdly natural. Outpost Infinity Siege is all about taking part in large-scale conflicts that start out with placing your units and defenses on the battlefield. And once war commences, you take control of those very units in first-person and try to hold your defenses. The game thrives on this element of juggling between different roles and responsibilities, and that sounds really fun and unique. It comes out for PC sometime in the near future.

Helldivers 2

In Helldivers 2, players are tasked to take on the role of warriors who are the last hope for the salvation of humanity. It’s a co-op shooter where you take part in large-scale conflicts, and the gameplay is looking pretty slick with explosions happening everywhere and characters getting embroiled in crossfire among others. It’s a game that’s meant to be experienced with a group of friends, and we will be doing that when Helldivers 2 comes out for PC and PS5 on 8 February, 2024.

Star Wars Outlaws

Star Wars Outlaws will thrust players into a fictional setting as they take control of Kay Vess, an outlaw trying to find a fresh start in an era overrun by crime syndicates. In development at Massive Entertainment, Star Wars Outlaws is being built using the Snowdrop Engine and will see players taking on high-stakes missions where they are free to choose between stealth and action however they see fit. It comes out sometime this year for PC and current-gen consoles.

Unrecord

Unrecord is one of those games that you can easily mistake for real life, and a lot of that praise could be attributed to the ultra-realistic visual presentation on offer. It’s built using Unreal Engine 5, and this first-person shooter flaunts almost every tool of the game engine to great effect – right from Nanite geometry to Lumen lighting and much more. The subtle camera shake and realistic shooting mechanics also help in selling the illusion of real-life footage, and Unrecord definitely has quite a lot of potential both as a tactical FPS and a visual showcase. It comes out for PC sometime in the near future.

Killing Floor 3

The Killing Floor series is characterized by large waves of zombies and a fast and frenetic gunplay loop, and those merits seem to be shining brightly in the upcoming entry. Killing Floor 3 not only iterates on what came before but also makes some new changes like a futuristic setting complete with a whole host of bioengineered zombies. You can team up with a group of friends for some good old-fashioned zombie slaughtering, so Killing Floor 3 could really end up being a great time. It comes out for PC, Xbox Series X/S, and PS5 sometime in the near future.

The Division 3

Despite the first game suffering from a rather tepid critical reception, The Division series has managed to make a name for itself in a sea of live-service experiences. With support for The Division 2 rounding up, the developer is gearing up for the next entry in the franchise which is currently in the works at Massive Entertainment. Not much is known about what it will entail, but there’s a great chance that it will also be a similarly fun game that’s worth sinking your teeth into. It will be released for current-gen consoles and PC at an unconfirmed date.

Tom Clancy’s The Division Heartland

Talking about all things The Division, we have The Division Heartland – the developer’s free-to-play offerings within the massively successful live-service franchise. It’s essentially the same experience in a new format, so you can expect some significant changes to how the content is spread out and how the progression will work. The Division Heartland will be released on PC, PS4, PS5, Xbox One, Xbox Series X/S sometime in the near future.

Beneath

Camel 101’s upcoming Beneath is a first-person shooter that takes place in a mysterious underwater world brimming with undead creatures and all forms of hideous nightmares. Beneath takes cues from contemporaries like Resident Evil and Eternal Darkness: Sanity’s Requiem, and tries to nail the right balance between horror and action with scarce availability of resources and a sanity meter that has the ability to significantly impact the gameplay. Beneath sounds like an interesting idea, and we will be checking it out when it releases on PC sometime this year.

As part of the update, players will be able to find new garments through the new levels and mission type. Enemies are also getting new toys, such as the new Geist module that allows monsters to turn invisible. The module can also be stolen by the player’s Pet Gun to give players a temporary cloaking device.

RIPOUT was released in Early Access back in October. The game is a co-op-centric sci-fi horror shooter that has players travel to different derelict spaceships in order to make their way to the end. Throughout their time exploring, players will uncover the game’s story, while also finding materials with which to upgrade their arsenal.

The Payload Update is the first part of the roadmap available on the game’s Steam page, with future updates focusing on new weapons and enemies, as well as new enemy types.

RIPOUT Payload Update Patch Notes:

System improvements and additional features

• Tutorial update – we have updated the tutorial steps with a new room purposed for practicing critter retrieval and using the pet on enemies
• We have added an animated outline around the hints text box
• Enemy dodge behavior – we have updated enemy behavior with the dodge feature. Now enemies will move more unpredictably and not go in a straight direction toward the player
• New music themes are added for different types of ship
• SFX orientation is improved for enemies and environment sounds. Now, the direction of those sounds should be clearer
• We have enabled the functionality to skip the Credits screen
• We have improved the weapon recoil system and weapon spread
• Added camera shakes on character landing
• Added camera shakes for Sidearms and Axe
• Added new blood hit effect on all enemies

Hotfix

• Major Bug Fixes
• Fixed an issue where the Pet doesn’t do damage on a weak spot if that weak spot is destroyed before the Pet attack is done
• Fixed an issue that locked a Player if escape was pressed in the mission complete screen
• Fixed an issue with Pet stuck on the enemy with a tentacle attached
• Fixed an issue where players can get locked in a black screen on Boss’s entrance
• Fixed an issue where a self-rescue token was not given to the players on the Boss level
• Fixed an issue with players getting Boss level in earlier sectors if they completed all quests

Minor Bug Fixes

• Fixed an issue of the wrong name tag shown for the player locally
• Fixed an issue of Enhancement station always being available for clients
• Fixed an issue with FOV
• Fixed an issue with sidearm third person equip animation
• Fixed issue on Boss level – door was missing making the players fall outside of the map
• Fixed an issue with critters trying to go for windows and jump on them
• Fixed an issue with Pet turret animation stopping after the first fire was shot from the Pet turret
• Fixed an issue of one Critter taking two spots on the enemies
• Fixed a visual issue where we were showing requirements on the 5th sector – Boss level
• Fixed an issue of Enemies getting stuck in a corrupted resurrection station
• Fixed an issue of Enemies starting to spawn even if you destroy the corrupted resurrection station
• Fixed an issue of Hazard turret being available as a Pet target after destruction
• Fixed an issue where all enemies were jumping while ensnared
• Fixed an issue where boom bugs didn’t have any VFX on the explosion
• Fixed an issue with the escape menu that didn’t work on the input
• Fixed an issue where pressing escape in the mission complete screen locks the player
• Fixed an issue where a dead dotter critter fires projectile after death
• Fixed an issue where Soldiers could hit players through the security point door
• Fixed material and mesh discrepancies between Mimic and normal door
• Fixed an issue of Dotter hazard, Mimic chair, and Turret not showing damage indication numbers

The Early Access release of RIPOUT comes with quite a bit of content right out of the box, including a 3-player co-op mode, ability upgrades for the player’s Pet Gun, 10 monster types and 8 critters, 8 different types of Pet Gun types, and 9 Suits with different buffs.

The studio has released a content roadmap on the game’s Steam page. While the roadmap doesn’t include any release dates for future updates, it does give us a glimpse at some of the future content planned for RIPOUT, such as new mission types like Payload and Cover, as well as the addition of new monster types, weapons, and other equipment.

RIPOUT also features support for single-player, with its difficulty scaling up or down depending on the number of players in a team.

Starfield 

Set in the far reaches of space, Starfield looks set to take the Bethesda RPG formula into an entirely new dimension – and it looks nothing short of breathtaking. You get to explore over a hundred different planets brimming with quests to track and people to meet, and the choices that you make during these quests will ultimately dictate the outcome of this adventure. Between a solid gameplay loop and impressive NASA-Punk designs, Starfield is looking to be worth all the hype and anticipation. It releases for PC and Xbox Series X/S on September 8, 2023. 

Starfield

Let’s get the most obvious one out of the way first. Bethesda Softworks’ upcoming Starfield is easily one of the most highly anticipated games right now. The game has recently received a lot of new details and Bethesda has done a fabulous job with its NASA-Punk designs. Starfield releases for Xbox Series X/S and PC in the first half of 2023.

Today, we will be looking at yet another similarly promising game from developer Pet Project Games – RIPOUT. RIPOUT is a co-op survival horror game that takes heavy inspiration from the likes of Prey and G.T.F.O. to create an experience that’s equal parts horrifying and an adrenaline-pumping thrill ride that’s bound to captivate legions of FPS fans from all over the world.

RIPOUT is set in the year 2084, a futuristic dystopia where humanity has to fend off aliens species for the survival of its race. You see, humans have lost the safe haven that is Earth and now the aliens who attacked the planet have followed the remaining survivors to space. There’s an entity by the name of Sanctuary that somehow holds the key to banishing these aliens – and you take upon the role of one of the last remaining soldiers on this very important quest to save the world.

The premise is simple, and seems pretty rooted in the standard tropes that come with a futuristic dystopia and post-apocalypse. Of course, most would agree that an action game like RIPOUT doesn’t necessarily need to focus its efforts on delivering a memorable narrative – as the central selling point is most certainly the core gameplay. That said, the game is also brimming with personality – thanks to its dark and dreary aesthetic and majestic spaceship architecture, and terror-inducing enemy designs. On the topic of art direction, one of the most interesting things about RIPOUT‘s art style is how it manages to create a horrifying vibe with its environments without resorting to extensive use of darkness. Sure, there are plenty of dark corners in the game’s many environments – but the game retains a decent level of visibility regardless. It’s highly reminiscent of Prey’s art style in that context, thanks to a brilliant combination of contrasting colors like red, green, brown, and grey, among others.

Now coming to the gameplay side of things, RIPOUT is a first-person horror game and plays exactly like one. You need to be tactical with your movements and shooting to make it out of most encounters alive. That said, RIPOUT is certainly unique in the fact that it’s a bit more fast-paced than something like Prey but also not as fast-paced as something like Shadow Warrior. As such, its mediocre pace of gameplay also lends a unique charm to it that makes it stand out amongst the ever-increasing crowd of first-person shooters.

Your main weapon for survival against the many alien species is a trusty Pet Gun. A weapon that’s equal parts companion and a full-fledged arsenal of destruction, the Pet Gun is easily one of the most creative weapons we have seen in recent games. The gun can morph into several shapes and forms – from a standard pistol to a shotgun to a grenade launcher to even a flamethrower. Of course, each weapon type serves a vital purpose in the combat proceedings – as you will be changing weapon types on the fly to suit your needs. Additionally, you can also throw the sentient pet gun at your enemies, dealing area-of-effect damage and culling the herd in the process.

The developer has also stated that players will have the option to customize their pet guns according to their playstyles, although it isn’t known exactly how that would pan out. Furthermore, players might also have the option to harness the power of enemies. If you look closely, you can see enemy tentacles hanging off the player’s left shoulder multiple times in the gameplay – which could indicate that they can be turned into a weapon.

And on the topic of enemies, RIPOUT has an interesting implementation of enemy types. Unlike most games that have a set amount of enemy types, RIPOUT will feature enemies that can reconfigure themselves according to the situation at hand to give players a challenging experience at all times. For instance, small enemy bodies may combine to form a bigger enemy that has a larger pool of health and deals more damage with every blow. At the same time, the enemy biomass could also re-shift to strengthen a certain body part – allowing it to be used as a stronger weapon. It’s easily one of the more interesting aspects of the game, and we can’t wait to see how this idea pans out with the full release and how this affects the moment-to-moment gameplay.

RIPOUT is a roguelite in that its levels are procedurally generated by a random generation algorithm. While there are a select number of mission types where objectives will presumably remain constant, the actual architecture of the environments and level layouts will change with every subsequent run. Completing these missions would most likely net players some currency that can be invested in making one’s character stronger than before, allowing them to take up challenges of higher difficulties and fine-tune their pet gun to their own needs. Developer Pet Project Games states that the average mission duration length would be anywhere from 10-20 minutes which should make these bite-sized missions highly replayable.

While players can go through the game solo, RIPOUT is meant to be played in co-op. We don’t know how many players can play together in a single session, but the developers have stated that it would be limited to small teams. In co-op play, players will have to play off each others’ strengths to have a shot at survival. The trailer showcases multiple instances of this, such as one player distracting a giant monster towards themselves while another shoots down the weak spots on the enemy’s back. Pet Project Games has also stated that the difficulty will scale according to the number of players in a single session, so players should expect to be up against a decent challenge regardless of their strength in numbers.

It’s currently in development for PC, Xbox Series X, Xbox Series S, and PS5 with a target release window of 2022. While it’s a pretty ambitious release window for a game that’s just been announced in an official capacity, we are keeping our fingers crossed for the time being.

There’s still a lot that we don’t know about RIPOUT, such as how the progression works or the many types of missions that players will be taking part in. However, the core premise of this roguelike co-op horror shooter is certainly promising. RIPOUT has more than a couple of neat tricks up its sleeve, and we are hoping that it manages to deliver a compelling experience that’s worth all the hype and anticipation – and then some more.

Note: The views expressed in this article are those of the author and do not necessarily represent the views of, and should not be attributed to, GamingBolt as an organization.