Gaming Weekly: Beast of Reincarnation Goes Platinum, The Relic Splits Opinion, Xenoblade Chronicles 2 Arrives on Switch 2#

Long Zhiri | August 3, 2026

Hello everyone, Long Zhiri here. This week’s column was written in the company of a pile of convenience-store bento boxes and two cups of strong tea. Game Freak’s long-gestating big game is nearly here, The Relic’s reception has sparked open war online, and Xenoblade Chronicles 2 is back online with a brand-new coat of paint. The newsroom ran as busy as a cafeteria right before the lunch bell.

Game Freak Sat on It for Thirty Years, Then Built the Open World for Itself First#

The week’s biggest topic is Beast of Reincarnation — out tomorrow, August 4, on PS5, Xbox Series X|S, and PC, and on Game Pass at launch. It’s Pokémon developer Game Freak’s first original action RPG built outside the Pokémon system, a lone heroine and her dog, set in a post-cataclysm Japan in the year 4026. Famitsu’s four reviewers scored it 9/9/8/9 for 35 points — straight into the Platinum Hall of Fame.

The newsroom argued about it all day.

Zixing fired first: “So Game Freak doesn’t lack the technical muscle — it just didn’t want an open world for Pokémon.” I’ve kept that line from player forums in my notes for ten years; this time the man finally built it himself. He then scrolled through the Steam page’s system requirements and muttered, “The 24 GB RAM minimum spec did get walked back — guess they chickened out.”

Wubian picked up from the other end: “Post-apocalypse, one heroine, one dog — that combo landed hard, and pre-registrations on Bilibili blew up ages ago. I can’t speak to its long-tail prospects, but week-one buzz will absolutely max out.”

Chasun, characteristically level-headed, took the systems apart instead: “The combat core is the parry. Parries build energy, and you spend it commanding the dog to unleash its Bloom arts. None of that is new for a soulslike, but if GF has made the mechanics solid, that alone is this year’s biggest surprise.” She paused, then added, “Not to mention — we already have a complete Beast of Reincarnation guide on the site. Anyone who wants to study the systems early should go dig through it.”

I chimed in from the side: the moment it unlocks tomorrow, I’m first in the grind. For ten years, Pokémon players waited for an open world that never came — Game Freak went and built it for itself first.

For years Game Freak has run in circles inside the Pokémon framework, and fans haven’t been shy about complaining over the graphical and technical stagnation. Now it has sidestepped the baggage of its own IP to build a grounded, hardcore action game and laid its technical foundation out for everyone to see.

Whatever the final sales look like, that courage — daring to throw itself into an unfamiliar lane — is enough to earn players’ goodwill. The guide page on our site was prepped in advance with ten-plus topics covering combat, builds, maps, items, and the main flow, ready to consult the moment the game unlocks.

The Relic: Big Ideas, Not Quite Enough Polish#

Released July 31, The Relic: First Guardian was the week’s second topic. I flagged in the last issue that I’d be grinding this open-world soulslike, and after several days of hands-on time, the one-line verdict is: this game has big ambitions and the chops don’t match them yet.

Start with the good. The worldbuilding runs deep — the ruins, the mythology, and the light-and-shadow puzzle design show real effort, and the open-world scaffolding is built convincingly. When the game’s key art dropped, half the newsroom stared at it for a good while, and Zhanlan Yingren rarely speaks unprompted: “Not many domestic studios can match this art quality.”

But the problems are just as visible. Combat feels floaty, parry windows swing between tight and loose, and the boss fights have ideas without the polish. Foreign outlets have landed on roughly the same verdict — 4gamer called it “ambitious but limited in execution,” and Final Weapon pointed straight at “skill tree and equipment systems that lack depth.” I’ve flagged all those pitfalls in the guide, so players planning to buy can skip a few wrong turns.

Wubian delivered the side jab: “The soulslike lane is brutal this year. Black Myth: Wukong, Wuchang: Fallen Feathers, plus a whole queue of similar titles waiting to launch — if The Relic came out three months later, it might not make a splash at all.”

Harsh words, but I think there’s truth in them. Soulslike players are picky: deliver a surprise and they’ll deliver the acclaim; deliver merely “passable” and all you get is “wait and see.”

For an open-world soulslike, its most praiseworthy trait is braiding the “open world” and “souls” threads together instead of just inflating the map the way so many imitators do. The ruin puzzles and mythological storytelling are its signature, and the light-and-shadow mechanisms are memorable within the genre. It’s the combat — the feel and the numbers tuning — that still falls a breath short of the true first tier. If you like your soulslikes with a sense of exploration, it’s still worth a shot; if your patience runs thin, wait until our guides have mapped out its gear routes and boss strategies, then jump in.

Xenoblade Chronicles 2 Is on Switch 2, and the Resolution Crowd Rejoices#

On July 30, the Switch 2 version of Xenoblade Chronicles 2 went live digitally (the physical edition waits until October 1). 4K/60fps visuals, a new M.O.M.O. sword, a Merc Raid mode, plus amiibo support — for longtime players, this is very nearly the game that once “sprinted with all its might on a handheld” being carried into the high-definition era.

Zixing couldn’t sit still at the sight of “4K/60fps”: “This is how it’s done. This is what Switch 2 is for. The original Switch version’s resolution is a disaster by today’s standards.”

Zhanlan Yingren agreed with Zixing for once: “The mushy handheld models of Rex and Pyra can finally be seen clearly. Honestly, the high-def upgrade alone is worth another playthrough.”

Chasun and I were more interested in the new systems and amiibo — the M.O.M.O. sword recreates that classic weapon from the first game, and the Merc Raid mode smooths out the material-grinding loop considerably. If you never finished it on Switch back in the day, or simply want to see Alrest in high definition, this edition deserves a fresh run.

When Xenoblade Chronicles 2 first landed on Switch, hardware limits earned it endless criticism over its resolution, and handheld mode was a blurry mess besides. Switch 2’s muscle has finally repaid that debt — 4K Alrest and smoother battle presentation give a game that always won on story and systems a look to match its ambitions. For veterans, it’s a reunion wrapped in nostalgia; for newcomers, it’s a perfect entry point, with the digital edition already live and the physical one on the way.

August’s New Releases Are Queuing Up to Empty Your Wallet#

With the week’s heavyweights covered, the usual sweep of next week’s release list:

Marvel Tokon: Fighting Souls lands on PS5 and PC — a fighting feast for Marvel fans. On August 14, Mafia: The Old Country arrives, the mob saga’s new entry — a blind buy for crime-story devotees. On August 18, Sinking City 2 brings the Cthulhu detective games back. On August 27, Metal Gear Solid Master Collection Vol.2 goes live, and with Resonance: A Plague Tale Legacy on the way, late August adds a Plague Tale prequel to the pile. Oh, and Hell Let Loose: Vietnam hits August 13 — a 50v50 Vietnam War battlefield for the hardcore shooter crowd to note.

I did the math — this month’s wallet isn’t surviving. Fighting, mob stories, Cthulhu, Metal Gear, a Vietnam mega-battle: nearly every kind of player finds their dish in August. The newsroom has already gone several rounds over “which one first,” settled nothing as usual, and everyone quietly memorized the release dates instead.

Still Happening This Week#

DragonSword: Awakening is running hot lately — a new open-world action title led by Park Jeong-sik, holding steady at the top of community discussions. Our full guide is already up, spanning twenty-plus topics across combat, builds, co-op, equipment, cooking, achievements, and bosses. Newcomers can copy the homework directly.

Halo: Campaign Evolved held its reception steady through launch week. As Halo’s historic first landing on PS5, player sentiment has been broadly positive. The pirates provided the comedy, though — a forced emulator crack resulted in crashes and instant exits everywhere, and the pirate experience has been miserable, which amounted to free advertising for our legit-copy guide. The guide page covers nineteen topics across systems, combat, weapons, achievements, multiplayer, and the remake changes — new players can navigate straight to what they need.

Lies of P’s (Lies of P) complete edition is also due within August — players who haven’t caught up on the expansion can hold out for the bundle. Our site’s twenty topics on its weapons, Legion Arms, builds, bosses, and DLC have long been ready to follow along once it lands.

Grand Theft Auto VI (Grand Theft Auto VI) has slipped again, pushed from May to November 19. The players look numb at this point — “Seriously? Again?” For this generation’s most anticipated open-world blockbuster, every delay adds months to the wait. Fortunately, the frameworks for our nineteen topics on characters, gameplay, the map, Online, and the series timeline are already standing — whenever it actually lands, the guides can keep pace.

Newsroom Talk#

With Game Freak suddenly producing a grounded, hardcore action game, newsroom feelings ran complicated this week. After work we drifted to the skewer-hot-pot stall downstairs again. The owner’s wife recognizes us now — she drops handfuls of skewers into the pot, the spice steam rises, and everyone starts talking.

Zixing lifted a slice of tripe and mused: “Do you think people who make games and people who make game guides are both just wrestling with themselves? GF wrestled with Pokémon for thirty years; we’ve wrestled difficulty curves across more than a hundred games.”

I thought it over and said: “Not the same. When GF finishes wrestling, players get a game. When we finish wrestling, readers skip the wrong turns. Run the numbers — we come out ahead.”

Chasun raised her glass: “Fine — here’s to Beast of Reincarnation selling big tomorrow, and to us having manuscripts to write next week.”

Wubian scrolled his phone without looking up: “Here’s to me finally beating The Relic’s last boss tonight.”

The table dissolved into laughter. The owner’s wife shook her head behind the counter, presumably deciding this skewer-eating crowd has a touch of occupational disease.

See you next week.

— Long Zhiri, NTGame Editor-in-Chief