Staff Article Lists

With Autumn soon giving way to Winter, it's the perfect time to cozy up with a hot beverage and your favorite video games. Fortunately Steam has you covered with a limited time Autumn Sale of everyones favorites. Ranging from the high budget highly acclaimed titles to Indie hits, this sale is sure to have something for everyone. Act fast though, it ends on Dec 4th. Let's take a look at some highlights!

Pokémon, easily one of the most popular franchises in all of gaming. Even the most casual gamers who have never touched Pokémon, know what Pikachu looks like. And with that popularity, comes a significant number of spin-offs and attempts to branch the franchise out. One of which is of course the Pokémon TCG. 

Released in 1996 not long after the games which it was based on, and just like those games, the Pokémon TCG quickly took off in popularity. So much so that they even made a Pokémon TCG game for the Game Boy. It was a golden era for GameFreak and their franchise. Even after Pokémon's popularity declined for a bit, the TCG scene remained active and to this day, it's considered one of the “Big 3” of TCGs alongside Yu-Gi-Oh and Magic: The Gathering. It’s received dedicated apps, at least two different digital versions and constantly updates alongside the video games. Then on October 30th, 2024 The Pokémon Company released Pokémon TCG Pocket, the newest app developed by DeNA(Who also worked on Pokémon Masters) and Creatures Inc which seeks to recapture that feeling of opening card packs and hoping for the rarest cards. So what is Pokémon TCG Pocket?

Your mousey crew lands on Aurania, a land of mystery and potential. What follows is an epic turn-based adventure filled with twists and turns, lots of interpersonal and faction-crossing drama, and plenty of combat. Wargroove 2 follows the events in Aurania 3 years after Queen Mercia and her allies defeated the ancient adversaries and restored peace to Aurania. Now, this team of explorers and researchers (with some formidable fighting skills) seems keen on unearthing forbidden tech that could have catastrophic consequences. Filled with beautiful sprites, luscious maps, and engaging cutscenes, Wargroove 2 turned out to be a great time for pixel-lovers and turn-based aficionados alike.

Welcome to "Fresh Fur!" Our weekly installment going over the newest game releases, and which ones you can expect to find anthros/furries in!

Check the list below for all the games we could find with animal/anthro influences and characters.

New Releases for the week of November 18-24, 2024:

• Once Alive (PC) - November 18
• Dimensionals (PC) - November 18 (Early Access)
• Towers of Aghasba (PC, PS5) - November 19 (Early Access)
• Microsoft Flight Simulator 2024 (Xbox Series X|S, PC) - November 19
• Toads of the Bayou (PC) - November 19
• Genshin Impact (Xbox Series X|S, Xbox One) - November 20
• Stalker 2: Heart of Chornobyl (Xbox Series X|S, PC) - November 20
• Luma Island (PC) - November 20
• SUPERVIVE (PC) - November 20
• Star Wars Outlaws (PC) - November 21
• Loco Motive (Switch, PC) - November 21
• Servonauts (Switch, PC) - November 21
• The Devil Within: Satgat (PS5, PC) - November 21
• Total War: Empire (iOS, Android) - November 21
• Mercury Abbey (PC) - November 22
• Spirit Mancer (PS5, Switch, PC) - November 22

*Bolded games have furry/animal influences/characters

Furry & Animal Steam Game Finds:

These games were found in the New Releases section of Steam this week and will be updated as more come out throughout the week!

What happens when you take the run-and-gun gameplay of a classic arcade game and replace it with strategy gameplay and sprinkle in roguelike elements as a topping? You get Metal Slug Tactics; A spin-off of the long-running iconic arcade franchise and, though it’s not a bad game, it’s one that does one area well but doesn’t really stick the landing in the other area.

An unusual elk was spotted in the highlands, and I was part of the hunting party racing to its last location. From the back of our journeykin, we pounced the elk and it fought with leyline-infused techniques. We were making progress, when it started running, forcing us to remount our journeykin and pursue it! We readied harpoons with chains to slow it as it zigged and zagged, trying to throw us off. It took several attempts but we stopped it and continued the assault. As before, we waylaid the elk, exhausting its vitality before it began to run again. This time our pursuit led us to another situation, a wolf pup was sickened and the kodan needed help gathering herbs to fight the sickness. It was looking rough, there weren’t enough people to hold off the titans and gather herbs. Trusting the party that began the hunt to finish it, I broke off and went to the pup’s aid.

This series of events is exactly why I love playing Guild Wars 2. You begin one of the many tasks that unfold in the world and it intercepts another task. These events are built to engage you with the world and convey the themes of each map. The Lowlands map doesn’t have a meta event, relying on small local events to convey kodan culture, from hunting and gathering to agriculture and combat. You tend to basic chores around towns, and maybe get an unusual request from a cryptozoologist, however, a strange rot spreads, and you’ll investigate the underlying threat while fighting its effects on the ecosystem.

Ever wanted to play a gun-totin’ llama engaged in a war against the evil alpaca empire? Then this game is for you! Speedollama (pronounced Speed-o-llama) is a fast-paced 2D side scroller where you choose one of three distinct llamas and battle your way through nine worlds in order to defeat the evil alpacas.

So, when I first heard of this game and saw the screenshots, I honestly thought this was another Contra-style game and, normally, I’d be less than thrilled. But, after playing the amazing Iron Meat, I was more open to another Contra-style indie game. Well, that’s what I thought I was going to get with this game but boy was I wrong. Not only is Speedollama nowhere close to Contra, it’s more akin to those run-and-gun flash games from sites like Newgrounds and Shockwave. Which is not a bad thing, mind you, as I grew up playing many titles with this style of gameplay on those websites back in High School. In fact, if I could boil this game down to one sentence, it’d be ‘Easy To Play and Easy To Master’ which, again, is not a negative.

The SaGa series is an interesting case in the JRPG world. It follows its own rules and was never quite as popular as Square Enix’s flagship Final Fantasy or even the much newer Bravely Default. Recently though, it's seen a bit of a resurgence with Romancing SaGa: Minstrel Song getting the remastered treatment and now Romancing SaGa 2: Revenge of the Seven. Even though it says 2, the SaGa series is quite a bit longer and like Final Fantasy, they don’t really relate to each other. So what is Romancing SaGa 2 about?

I’ve been following Fruitbus for a while, which piqued my interest with its quirky animal characters, boppy sound design, and charming visual style. Since I played the demo, the developer Krillbite has refined the concept they introduced, which has you driving around a set of islands, chopping and cooking up food recipes for people around the various areas using fruits, veggies, and other foodstuffs that you acquire by gathering them through various means as you explore. It’s a simple concept with a few twists and bugs to navigate around along the way, but overall I truly enjoyed my time with Fruitbus and its cast of characters.

I love the fact that we’re getting so many remasterings and re-releases of classic video games as of late. From classics like the upcoming Gex Trilogy to all the titles Nightdive Studios put out, we seem to be living in a golden age for this market and I’m all for it. However, not all games hold up well and, sadly, this is one of them: Aero The Acro-Bat. First of all, I don’t ever even remember hearing about this game’s existence. I mean, outside of a small blurb in an old Nintendo Power magazine, I don’t recall ever seeing anybody talk about it. Heck, I never even saw it in any YouTube videos on the subject of forgotten mascots, so you’d think that means this is a hidden gem, yes? If we’re talking about the original console versions, then maybe, but not in this game’s case.