With the new year well underway, PlayStation players have a lot to look forward to including Ratchet and Clank: Rift Apart, God of War Ragnarok, Returnal, and hopefully, some more PlayStation 5 stock in the not-so-distant future.
On top of new games, Sony also appears to be going all out with PlayStation Plus this generation and using the service as an incentive to push exciting PS5 games including the upcoming Destruction AllStars. As such, here's our complete PS Plus free games wish list for February 2021.
Dragon Ball Z: Kakarot
Typically, Dragon Ball Z games have almost always landed in the fighting genre, and while it's certainly fitting for the experience, it leaves a lot to be desired for players that wanted something with more depth, something different. With a brand new character arriving in Dragon Ball FighterZ and proving the fighting game is still alive and well, Bandai Namco and CyberConnect2 had the opportunity to do something new with the franchise and thus Dragon Ball Z: Kakarot was born, a single-player action-RPG that retold the story of its titular character.
Now celebrating its one year anniversary, Dragon Ball Z: Kakarot combines the mechanics of a fighting game and an open-world action-RPG and retells the Dragon Ball Z story through seven playable characters including Goku, Vegeta, Gohan, Piccolo, Future Trunks, Gotenks, and Vegito. On top of the main story and boss battles, players can explore the open-world, complete side quests, go fishing, and collect Z-orbs to upgrade Goku's abilities. Dragon Ball Z: Kakarot wasn't the groundbreaking reinvention players might have hope it would be, but it is an excellent game that tries something new and tugs at the nostalgia heartstrings quite a lot.
Observer: System Redux
After the success of the 2014 horror short P.T., Polish developer Bloober Team took inspiration from the title and began work on a something new that would shape the future of the studio, a psychological horror game called Layers of Fear that focused on story, puzzle-solving, and misdirection. Since Layers of Fear, Bloober Team has become a prolific horror developer with games like Blair Witch, Layers of Fear 2, and the upcoming Xbox exclusive The Medium on its portfolio. As part of the next-gen launch lineup on top of its work on The Medium, Bloober Team also chose to revisit one of its earlier titles, the cyberpunk horror game, Observer.
Observer: System Redux is a next-gen remaster of Observer, a cyberpunk-themed psychological horror game about a digital plague that killed thousands and sent the world into war, poverty, and rampant drug use. Starring Blade Runner's Rutger Hauer in the lead role, players are sent to a lower-class apartment block to uncover the whereabouts of his son and whos behind a series of recent deaths. Featuring upgraded visuals, ray-tracing, 4K HDR, and 60 FPS gameplay, System Redux is not only the best way to play Observer, but it's also an excellent showcase of what these new consoles are capable of.
The Walking Dead: Saints and Sinners
The Walking Dead is a franchise that seems like it would translate perfectly to video games, but despite its popularity, it has had an uneven past at best. Telltale's The Walking Dead series is still widely considered to be one of the best adventure games of the last decade, whereas The Walking Dead: Survival Instinct and The Walking Dead: Onslaught were critically panned with almost no redeeming qualities. The problem is that most of these games try to capitalize on The Walking Dead brand rather than its premise, and that's where The Walking Dead: Saints and Sinners comes out on top.
Developed by Skydance Interactive, the video game division of the film production company behind Mission: Impossible - Fallout and the upcoming Top Gun Maverick, The Walking Dead: Saints and Sinners is a first-person shooter for PlayStation VR where the goal is to survive by whatever means necessary. Featuring a 10-15 hour campaign, crafting and upgrade systems and a mechanic called 'Stir the Herd' that spawns a devastating horde on a timer, The Walking Dead: Saints and Sinners is gritty, violent, terrifying, and one of the best adaptations of the franchise in video games.
Reminder: Destruction AllStars Will Be Available on PS5
For the past three months, Sony has offered three games in its PlayStation Plus free games lineup: two PS4 games and a third PS5 game. Starting in February, Destruction AllStars will be available for free for two months, exclusively on PlayStation 5, similar to Bugsnax which was available from November to January. Originally intended as a PS5 launch title, Destruction AllStars promises a "global sports entertainment event where stars and cars collide" with sixteen unique playable heroes across its single-player and multiplayer modes.
PlayStation Plus members receive at least two free games every month with their subscription.