Welcome to our latest roundup of what's going on in the indie game space. A bunch of titles that are arriving very late to make it into game of the year conversations debuted this week, and we learned some new details about upcoming projects, such as a release date for a rad-looking arena shooter called Don't Stop, Girlypop.
Marvel Cosmic Invasion is one of the higher-profile indies to hit consoles and PC this week. It's from Tribute Games and publisher Dotemu, the same pair that brought us Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Shredder's Revenge. Cosmic Invasion largely draws from the same playbook: it's also a retro-style side-scrolling beat-'em-up with a look that apes the Marvel animated shows from the '90s.
It's an enjoyable enough game, largely thanks to the variety of characters and how differently they play. Captain America is one of my favorites. Each character has a secondary move (often a ranged attack) to go with their basic melee strikes, and Cap's one has no ammo or cooldown. I never grew tired of spamming his shield projectile attack and knocking enemies off the screen.
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I really enjoyed playing as She-Hulk too. Her secondary move involves grabbing an enemy and throwing them around. She-Hulk can also toss them into the air then leap with McTominay-esque athleticism to deliver a kick and send the baddie crashing into its cohorts. The character swap system (each player chooses two and can switch between them any time) evokes tag fighting games and the co-op features work well too.
There isn't a ton of depth to Marvel Cosmic Invasion, unfortunately, but the presentation is spot on. It's out now on Steam, Nintendo Switch, Nintendo Switch 2, PlayStation 5 and Xbox Series X/S for $30. It's also on Game Pass Ultimate and PC Game Pass.
New releases
It only took 13 years from announcement to release but survival horror title Routine (from Lunar Software and publisher Raw Fury) has emerged on Steam, the Xbox PC app, Xbox One, Xbox Series X/S and Xbox Cloud. It's available on Game Pass Ultimate and PC Game Pass.
Routine offers up a slice of liminal space terror with a dash of retro-futurism. Lunar Software based the aesthetic on "how people from the 1980s might envision a believable moon base" with analogue technology.
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