12 Cool Games We Saw

This is my second PAX East singing the praises of Fretless, the turn-based deck-building rhythm RPG from Ritual Studios. Thankfully, the game is much closer to release this year as we’re only a week away from its May 22 launch, so folks won’t have to wait much longer to check out what the team has been cooking. As I wrote last year, Fretless is a loving blend of several genres, but what stands out is how its musicality is woven into every fabric. You wield instruments as weapons, and the music that plays in battle changes based on what you’re using, whether that’s a twangy acoustic guitar or a rumbling bass, so you’re basically composing a different song for each attack you use or spell you cast.

This time around, one of my big takeaways was that the rhythmic nature of its battle system meant that its timing-based mechanics had a consistency and clarity I was missing in Clair Obscur: Expedition 33, another recent turn-based RPG that uses timing mechanics for parries and dodging. The team at Ritual Studios said it wasn’t looking to compete with Sandfall Interactive’s RPG when I made the comparison, but after spending dozens of hours not sure if I was about to get walloped by a monster or if I would gracefully dodge its incoming attacks in the hit French RPG, reliably letting my fingers dance on the block button to the rhythm of a song felt effortless. I can’t wait to play more of Fretless when it launches on PC later this month.