YokoXevi, developed by GW's-Workshop, is the first game out of the gate for MSXdev26. The yearly competition for new MSX software has only just opened, and one of its most reliable regulars has already put a shooter on the table.
If you follow the MSX homebrew scene even loosely, the name GW's-Workshop probably rings a bell. Their MSX1 shooters have landed near the top of earlier editions again and again. So when they show up this early with another one, people notice.
A Quick Primer on MSXdev
For anyone new to this corner of retro gaming, MSXdev is an annual contest where developers build brand-new games for MSX computers, the home computer standard that still has a devoted following. The "26" marks this year's round. Entries go up on the official MSXDev website, and that is also where the details about YokoXevi come from.
Vacuum Pilot 2 is opening its doors to anyone who wants to play. The 2D speedrunning game is now in open beta, and it keeps things simple on the input side: everything runs through your mouse. No keyboard, no controller, just a cursor and a clock that never stops ticking.
The pitch is fast times against players from all over the world. The beta also brings a level editor, ranked play and servers that host up to sixteen racers at once.
Point, Hold, Go
The core idea fits in one sentence. You hold the left mouse button, and your little vacuum pilot speeds toward wherever your cursor happens to be. Let go, and you stop pushing forward. That's the whole control scheme.
Some disappointments stick around for a very long time. If you owned an Atari ST in the early nineties, one of them was probably Flashback. Delphine Software's cinematic platformer came out in 1992 and turned up on plenty of machines, but Atari's 16-bit home computer was never one of them.
Over 30 years later, developer Neil Rackett is fixing that. His Atari ST version of Flashback is still a work in progress, but it's playable, and ST owners are invited to try it.
Not a Straight Port
Rackett isn't rebuilding the game from scratch. His starting point is REminiscence, Gregory Montoir's modern re-implementation of the original Flashback engine. Rackett has ported it to the ST using STDL and the data files from the Amiga version.
Chosen by Odin is a co-op action role-playing game that takes Norse mythology and adds a tabletop twist. The end of the world is coming, cults are pushing it along, and your only hope is a handful of mythological warriors and a set of dice. A playtest is now open for sign-ups, so anyone curious can request access and try it before release.
There's something appealing about a game that treats Ragnarok as a deadline. You aren't just surviving the apocalypse. You're racing it.
Nine Realms, One Bad Day
The setting spans the Nine Realms, the interconnected worlds of Norse myth that include places like Asgard and Midgard. In Chosen by Odin, apocalyptic cults devoted to Ragnarok, the prophesied end of the gods, are working to bring about the final collapse. Your warriors are there to stop them.
Some games want you to save the world. Littlehaven just wants you to make a small town a little nicer to live in. Honestly, that sounds like a pretty good deal to me.
The game was playable at Gamescom, the big annual games trade show in Germany. The folks over at Indie Games Plus got their hands on it there and came away charmed. It's a cozy builder about community, decoration and slowly turning a quiet village into somewhere people actually want to be.
The Town's Official Decorator
Here's the setup. You play as a very handy person who has just moved to a small town. Nobody hands you a crisis to fix or a deadline to beat. There's very little pressure on you at all. You spend your days wandering around and making the whole village better, bit by bit.
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