The home stretch is firmly upon us! 10 months have been completed and there are only 2 months left of 2024. That may feel impossible, but it is true. And since we are getting so close to the end, the League has started to lose its malleability.
The battles for 1st place have been greatly reduced to a late December duel, as Dougsvest Digital & Bearded Champions try to answer the question, “How great is Indiana Jones?” People who once thought they might be able to sneak their way into the Top3 spots, have now either given up or are close to giving up hope. I bet a lot of us are wondering if we should’ve used our last drop game slot to pick up a good “keeper” for next year, or maybe we aren’t even thinking about the Deer Critic League anymore. Those last 1 or 2 vacant game slots will just stay that way until 2025.
October was a busy month for game releases that either solidified your quest for League domination or confirmed that the championship would be won in a city far from our own. Let’s take a quick look back at how October shook out. In this past month of October, we had 12 games released in the League:
- Mech Warrior 5: Clans – Lambda Strain Games (6.6pts)
- Silent Hill 2 remake – Dougsvest Digital (17.2pts)
- Metaphor ReFantasio – Jersey-Rican Productions (24.8pts)
- Dragon Ball Z: Sparking! ZERO – Jersey-Rican Productions (12.2pts)
- Europa – Ranch Walker Inc (4pts)
- NEVA – Dougsvest Digital (16.7pts)
- Super Mario Party Jamboree – Bearded Champions (11.4pts)
- Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Mutants Unleashed – Crystal Cross Games (-7.3pts)
- Batman: Arkham Shadow – Vapor-Wares (14pts)
- Call of Duty: Black Ops 6 – Jersey-Rican Productions (13.5pts)
- Life is Strange: Double Exposure – Wolfpack Games (2pts)
- Dragon Age: The Veilguard – Ranch Walker Inc (11.7pts)
And with that, this is how the league is currently structured (as of November 4th – sorry for the delay):
Just think back to September 6th when we were surprised at how well Astro Bot performed and how it propelled Micah and Dougsvest Digital into 1st place, overtaking Adam who had been in the top spot for months. Now here we are in the beginning of November, and it’s almost a done deal that Micah will finish in 1st place overall and earn his (much coveted) SECOND Championship trophy! Of course, he did this by continuing to have great release after great release. Silent Hill 2 remake (17.2pts) and NEVA (16.7pts) both released in October to great scores/reviews.
Other publishers tried to stave off the successes of Dougsvest Digital by having some great releases of their own, but to no avail: Bearded Champions saw the release of Super Mario Party Jamboree (11.4pts) which did impress – especially after some mediocre Super Mario Party games the last several years. I (Alex / Jersey-Rican Productions) had my biggest month thus far through three game releases. First, the highly acclaimed, Metaphor ReFantasio (24.8pts), then a great fighting game Dragon Ball Z: Sparking! Zero (12.2pts), and lastly, a bounce-back shooter in Call of Duty: Black Ops 6 (13.5pts). Ranch Walker Inc tried to reclaim the top spot with Dragon Age: The Veilguard (14pts) but none of these releases were enough to catch up to Micah. If anything, he was able to separate himself further from the pack this month somehow.
I would encourage us to look ahead and see all the games that we will add to our tally in the coming month, but now that Micah has a solid 30 point lead on the next publisher, I’m not sure we can do much. Either we cheer in Dougsvest Digital’s success, or we take the more sinister route and hope that Indiana Jones and the Great Circle explodes in December with 9’s and 10’s across the board, thus pulling Micah’s score back down to the rest of us! (Bwah ha ha ha!)
This November we are looking at 8 more game releases to the Deer Critics League. The games are (in release order):
- Metal Slug Tactics – Lambda Strain Games (11/05)
- Metro Awakening (VR) – SadDadBod Dev (11/07)
- Mario & Luigi: Brothership – Jersey-Rican Productions (11/07)
- Slitterhead – Wolfpack Games (11/08)
- The Rise of the Golden Idol – Lambda Strain Games (11/12)
- LEGO Horizon Adventures – Dougsvest Digital (11/14)
- Microsoft Flight Simulator 2024 – Jersey-Rican Productions (11/19)
- S.T.A.L.K.E.R. 2: Heart of Chornobyl – Wolfpack Games (11/20)
Will there be a stand-out game among these? Will a game shine so bright that it creeps their publisher ever closer to Micah’s 1st place status? I thought I would pick out a couple of games that should be good, but maybe they will be SO GOOD, that it’ll propel their publisher way up in the standings!
Metro Awakening (VR) – Vertigo Games, Deep Silver
Fantasy Critic is giving this VR title a pre-release projected score of 4.7 points. I don’t know how good this game will be, but I’ve seen some previews and some trailers and to me, it looks like this game has great potential to do much better than that! The staples of maneuvering through the dark Russian subway (metro) tunnels in order to achieve some goal seems perfect for the VR setting. Also, the developer (Vertigo Games) worked on the highly rated Arizona Sunshine VR games, so this seems like a good fit for them. The plot for this title involves a doctor named Sedar, who must venture through the Metro in order to save and reunite with his wife. He’s not a soldier, so this will be a more difficult journey for him than for some of the protagonists of past games.
S.T.A.L.K.E.R. 2: Heart of Chornobyl – GSC Game World
Fantasy Critic is giving this game a pre-release projected score of 11.8 points. This highly anticipated title has been a long-time coming. I’m not an expert in FPS titles, or survival titles, but the scuttlebutt that I heard leading up to its initial reveal, alerted me to it’s potential. And now, between the long wait and the circumstances surrounding the development team trying to complete this game amongst the hardships of war and other struggles surrounding the team and their country, I think that the anticipation for this game has the potential to help propel this game into higher reviews than people may think possible. We will know soon enough!
Well, that’s it!
Take care & God Bless,
Alex C.
Deer Critics League 