Gaming

A bittersweet return of Psychonauts 2

Suda51 isn’t the only ’90s game auteur with a homecoming this month: Tim Schaffer’s Psychonauts 2 finally arrives Aug. 25. The original was the first from Double Fine, the studio Schaffer founded after leaving LucasArts, where he designed classics like Grim Fandango, Full Throttle and entries in the Monkey Island series. Psychonauts followed Raz, a young telekinetic who snuck into a summer camp training facility for other child psychics. Hopping between brain and exploring the bizarre landscape of local psyches, Raz was able to uncover a string of conspiracies.

Psychonauts 2 sees Raz admitted to the secret Psychonauts agency proper, only to unleash more mental mayhem. But Psychonauts 2 also marks a bittersweet occasion. Since its founding, Double Fine has the most prominent independent studio out there, but—having been purchased by Microsoft in 2019—this will be the last Double Fine game before the studio doubles down on Xbox projects.

Try to break the cycle in Twelve Minutes

COVID has shown us how life confined to our apartments can seem to stretch on forever, but the star of Annapurna Interactive’s Twelve Minutes is experiencing the nightmare on a whole other level. Starring James McAvoy, Daisy Ridley and Willem Dafoe, Twelve Minutes follows a couple trapped in a time loop, where police storm into the player’s living room and accuse their pregnant wife of murder before killing her.

With only the 12 minutes in the time loop to work with, the player must solve the mystery and prevent tragedy with only their wits and what’s immediately available in their living space. Break the cycle when Twelve Minutes arrives on Steam and Xbox Aug. 19.