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Apple Arcade debuts four new games.

Almost exactly a month ago, tech giant Apple launched its gaming subscription service, Apple Arcade. At launch, the service offered unlimited access to 70 games for $4.99 a month. Right from the start there were console quality experiences like Neo Cab, Sayonara Wild Hearts and Shantae and the Seven Sirens.

Since then, Apple has slowly expanded the line-up. Earlier this month, Pilgrims, Inmost, The Bradwell Conspiracy and more debuted on the platform. Today, Apple added four new games, including one featuring a very famous gaming mascot.

The new games are: Pac-Man Party Royale, Manifold Garden, Things That Go Bump and Ballistic Baseball.

Expanding the Arcade

Despite the connotations typically associated with the word “royale” in a post-PUBG world, the new Pac-Man pits up to four players against each other, not 99. Mostly, it’s multiplayer Pac-Man, though the addition of the “256-glitch” means that after a certain amount of time without a winner, the maze will begin to shrink.

Pac-Man Party Royale

Manifold Garden is a first-person puzzler that creator William Chyr has been hard at work on for seven years. The game pairs Escher-esque architectural design with a Moebius-like comic book aesthetic. It’s also available, for $19.99, through the Epic Games Store.

Things That Go Bump is a bit mysterious to me — it has no virtually Internet presence; Googling “things that go bump game” brings up a text adventure from 2010. But, it looks like a single- or multiplayer action game inspired by Japanese architecture and yokai.

And, Ballistic Baseball is a PvP baseball game with customizable characters and RPG elements.

Of course, before I get to any of these, I need to finish Mutazione, which is excellent and the most sweetly melancholy game I’ve played in a long time. Maybe ever? Play Mutazione, right now is what I’m saying.


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