The best games we played at PAX East 2024: zombies, slime, and more
It’s been a busy month for gaming enthusiasts. As last week’s Game Developers Conference wrapped up in San Francisco, PAX East kicked off for a fun weekend in Boston. We were on hand for the East Coast show, exploring the show floor to check out some upcoming games.
As always, the show was a celebration of all things gaming. The halls were packed with players, cosplayers, and developers, as well as kiosks full of game demos. We went hands-on with many great titles at this year’s show. These are some of the standouts that you need to know about.
Lucid
The one game it seemed like no one could stop talking about at PAX East was Lucid. Made by The Matte Black Studio, this 2D action platformer features gorgeous pixel art and buttery smooth Mega Man X-meets-Celeste gameplay. Its colorful Crystal-Punk world looks great, particularly its clever use of depth of field in the background and foreground. It strikes a great balance of resembling something from the Super Nintendo era but with looks and effects that would never have been possible.
Related- These are the 10 best games we played at Gamescom 2022
The levels are interlocking and full of secrets, ala Super Metroid. Defeating enemies using a combination of shooting and sword slashes feels great, and I immediately fell in love with the movement system. You have limited charges of air jumps and dashes, but hitting sword slashes renews them. That means you can chain long combinations in combat or traversal, never touching the ground with skillful play. The most important and hardest-to-describe element of a game like this is feel, and what I played of Lucid absolutely nailed it. This was the surprise hit of the show.
Into the Dead: Our Darkest Days
The pitch for Into the Dead: Our Darkest Day is simple: What if State of Decay was a polished 2D side-scroller? That’s the ambitious question developer/publisher PikPok set out to answer in bringing their mobile exclusive Into the Dead franchise to PC for the first time. Set
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