A few games have been announced, recently, that I hope are of interest to you! This may have had something to do with E3...? It seems like a lot of games have been announced in the past week.

Anyway, you’ve probably heard all about these games by now, but I’m just reminding you to care about them, and not about all those other shitty games.

Captain Rainbow is the new game by Skip! That’s exciting! You can read about it here and here and also here. The game was announced by Nintendo, and apparently the fact that it’s made by Skip – while being obvious; just look at it – hasn’t been officially confirmed, so allow me to unofficially confirm it: Hirofumi Taniguchi told me about Captain Rainbow back in January, while we were waiting in line for Fami-mode. So that’s straight from the horse’s sound designer’s mouth.

Probably safe to assume it’s hikarin doing the art; don’t have a clue who’s directing it! I’ll try to find out, but, eh, we’ll all know soon enough.

Rhythm Tengoku Gold – or just Rhythm Heaven, as they’re calling the English version – is the DS sequel to Rhythm Tengoku, one of my favourite games, and certainly my favourite game on the GBA. It’s wonderful and brilliant for too many reasons to explain in a short paragraph; I should do a review sometime. It’s by the same team who made Wario Ware, and you should think of it as ‘the game they made after Wario Ware’, because all the Wario Ware sequels were pointless and stupid, whereas you can tell that Rhythm Tengoku is a game they really wanted to make.

Whether Rhythm Tengoku Gold was made for love, or because Nintendo told them to, I don’t know. But a Rhythm Tengoku game being released internationally is good news, I reckon.

Finally, some wonnnnnderful news for everybody: Game Center CX – previously lauded here, by me – is coming out in English, as Retro Game Challenge! (And so is the TV series it’s based on, apparently.) This means that you, reader of English, will be able to play and enjoy this fun and extraordinary and important game. I really never expected Game Center CX to get an English release, so this news was an exciting surprise!

Dessgeega, in her analysis linked just above, describes Game Center CX – or Retro Game Challenge – as “a fictionalized digital history of the experience of growing up with a magic box full of secrets beneath your tv,” and I think that’s about the best summary anyone could come up with. Everyone reading this should play the game, especially our younger readers, who grew up with the PlayStation rather than the NES. I’m looking forward to hearing what you think of it!

So, those are the games I give a shit about. Is anything missing? Is there an upcoming game I ought to be excited about, but maybe I haven’t heard about it or something? Tell me – I really would like to know.