Eurogamer Weekly Digest, 26th October – highlights you might have missed this week in features, reviews, and news
And here we are again; seven days older, seven days wiser, and if you were silly enough to watch that VHS tape, seven days to die. That means we’re back with another Weekly Digest – in which we recap some of the highlights you might have missed over this busy week on Eurogamer. This time around, Tom was surprised how much he enjoyed Ninja Gaiden 4 despite being officially rubbish at video games; Connor dipped his toes into Arc Raiders and made some new friends (nothing to do with his toes); I embarked on a journey of relentless squirting for my PowerWash Simulator 2 review, and Bertie had a chat with DayZ creator Dean Hall about his successes and studio struggles. There’s plenty more too, so for the full recap read on!
Returning to Pokémon Legends: Arceus’ rose-tinted take on the past, and the hard questions it raises about Japanese history
Pokémon Legends: Z-A is here and doing very well for itself. But while Pokémon fans have been cavorting around Lumiose City this week, Eurogamer contributor Edward Hawkes turned his attention back to 2022’s Pokémon Legends: Arceus and its rose-tinted reimagining of Japan’s past. Arceus’ setting of Hisui draws heavy inspiration from the northern Japanese island Hokkaido in the late-ish 1800s, but as Edward puts it, “The problem with time travel is that, when we go digging up the past, we sometimes unearth painful memories.” And Arceus freely borrows elements from a tumultuous period in history characterised by colonial expansionism, slow bureaucratic cruelty, and, often, casualties. It’s tricky territory that GameFreak charts in Arceus, and Edward examined the studio’s choices further in his fascinating article.
You can read Edward’s full exploration of Pokémon Legends: Arceus hereTo see this content please enable targeting cookies.
Ludvig Forssell reveals how Death Stranding’s most emotionally devastating moment came to be
In anticipation of Death Stranding’s upcoming Strands of Harmony concert world tour, which features a live orchestra and singers performing music from Hideo Kojima’s idiosyncratic action-adventure series, Eurogamer’s Ed Nightingale recently chatted with Death Stranding composer Ludvig Forssell about his music and more. In a continuation of that conversation, Ed this week dug a little deeper into the song that accompanies one of the game’s most emotionally devastating moments, discussing its genesis with Forssell and vocalist Jenny Plant.
