Top New Game Releases On Switch, PS4, Xbox One, And PC This Week — August 25-31, 2019

Normally, New Releases highlights five of the biggest games launching on a given week, but there’s just too much on the horizon to limit ourselves this time. We’ve got new games from respected developers like Patrice Désilets’ Ancestors: The Humankind Odyssey and Remedy’s Control. We’ve got horror games like Blair Witch and The Dark Pictures: Man of Medan. Nintendo is bringing the Switch-exclusive Astral Chain and a new mobile adventure with Pokemon Masters. On top of all that, the MMO crowd can relive the glory days with World of Warcraft Classic.

Ancestors: The Humankind Odyssey — August 27

Available on: PC

Ancestors comes from Patrice Désilets, known for his work on the Assassin’s Creed series, and you’ll definitely be doing plenty of climbing and leaping since this game puts you in control of an ape clan in Africa. Your goal is eat, drink, sleep, and just survive in a dangerous world full of predators until you evolve. To do this, you’ll have to level up, procreate, and pass traits onto new generations of your clan.

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Control — August 27

Available on: PS4, Xbox One, PC

The latest game from Alan Wake and Quantum Break developer Remedy gets its name from the Federal Bureau of Control, a fictional government agency that handles cases where the laws of physics and conventional science just don’t add up. Enter protagonist Jesse Faden, who can fling bad guys and float around using her psychic powers. She’s infiltrated the FBC to find her missing brother, and she’ll have to shoot her way through a few men in black to find him.

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World of Warcraft Classic — August 27

Available on: PC

If you’ve been yearning to return to an older version of WoW, Classic is exactly what you’ve been waiting for. Classic looks and plays the way WoW did during version 1.12 (the Drums of War update), a time before The Burning Crusade even launched. WoW subscribers get access to Classic at no additional cost.

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Pokemon Masters — August 29

Available on: iOS, Android

It may be a Pokemon game, but Masters won’t ask you to catch ’em all like Sword & Shield. Masters is set on the island region of Pasio, where trainers battle alongside a single Pokemon, and these duos are known as Sync Pairs. You can recruit Sync Pairs to your side and engage in 3v3 battles as you seek to become champion.

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Astral Chain — August 30

Available on: Switch

If you know Platinum Games’ portfolio of titles like Bayonetta and Vanquish, then you know what to expect from Astral Chain. Your police offer protagonist is chained to a living weapon known as a Legion, and the two of you can swing around the battlefield to battle monsters in stylish combat. As you might be able to guess from the name, you can even travel to the Astral Plane to discover where the monsters originate.

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Blair Witch — August 30

Available on: Xbox One, PC

Layers of Fear developer Bloober Team is revisiting the cult classic movie franchise with this canonical video game entry, featuring the studio’s signature psychological horror flavor. You play as a cop looking for a missing boy in the famously haunted Black Hills Forest. At least you have your canine companion Bullet to help sniff out any witches.

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The Dark Pictures: Man of Medan — August 30

Available on: PS4, Xbox One, PC

Blair Witch isn’t the only horror game dropping this week. Man of Medan is the first entry in The Dark Pictures, a new anthology series from Until Dawn developer Supermassive Games. Like with Until Dawn, your choices in Man of Medan can completely change the outcome of the story, a tale which involves teens on a ghost ship in the middle of the South Pacific Ocean. You can experience the spooky story in singe-player, pass the controller around for local co-op, or try online multiplayer, where the story actually splits into different characters’ perspectives.

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August is at its end, so the next episode of New Releases will take a look at what the new month is bringing to the table. September has big-name shooters like Gears 5 and Borderlands 3, plus reimagined classics like The Legend of Zelda: Link’s Awakening on Switch.