We are now at the end of our third week in a row with four releases in the run up to the “publishers afraid to release too close to GTA VI” zone, and we saw a pretty big change in the league forecast.

(With 50+ titles landing every day on Steam, this fear of GTA VI isn’t really a thing in my opinion, save for a few big titles and studios that needed some excuse to slip a date anyway.  Looking at you Squadron 42.  But abject fear is the gaming press narrative lately.)

Fantasy Critic League – Like Fantasy Football, but for Video Games

But to appreciate what changed over the course of week forty-one, we have to start with the scoreboard from the previous week to set the stage.

Week 40 Scores

Week forty closed out with Arhanta landing in first place and the league forecasting them as the second place finisher overall.

The first score I want to mention is yet another Warhammer title.

  • Total War: WARHAMMER III – Lords of the End Times
    • [Unpublished]
    • Now has a score of 85.7

The only reason I want to mention this is that I grabbed this title back in January as part of the initial draft, then dropped it for Rayman Legends Told, which then was delayed, so I dropped it and picked up WoW Forever.  So WoW Forever needs to beat that for my swaps to have been at all worthwhile.  We shall see.

The first releases for the week landed Monday evening with Shilgrod’s pick Star Wars: Galactic Racer hitting.

Star Wars Galactic Racer

It had already started off with a score of 86.8 last week.

Likewise, Gears of War: E-Day, in Potshot’s lineup, landed Monday evening.

Gears of War: E-Day

It also had a score in place, having hit 87.2 during week forty.

Those two arriving saw the first movement of the week on the scoreboard.

  • Publisher Score Updates
    • S Class Warfare Studios (p0tsh0t)
      • Score has gone UP from 87.8 to 105.5
      • Moved from 6th place to 3rd place
    • Anthania Interactive (Ula)
      • Moved from 3rd place to 4th place
    • Corr’s Creative Collective (Corr)
      • Moved from 4th place to 5th place
    • Play Forever Mwahahaha (Shintar)
      • Moved from 5th place to 6th place
    • Rusty Shackleford (Shilgrod)
      • Score has gone UP from 43.3 to 60.6
      • Moved from 10th place to 7th place
    • Pretty Blue Fox Games (Bhagpuss)
      • Moved from 7th place to 8th place
    • Crash and Burn Games (Shawn)
      • Moved from 8th place to 9th place
    • Green River Gaming (Nimgimli)
      • Moved from 9th place to 10th place

That was followed the next day with an update for Nighthawks, which got a bit of a boost on further reviews.

  • Nighthawks
    • [Picked by Pretty Blue Fox Games (Bhagpuss)]
    • Score has gone UP from 79.7 to 81.0

Bhagpuss also saw another of his picks finally get enough top critic reviews to get on the scoreboard as Nivalis Nights arrived with a 75.

  • Nivalis Nights
    • [Picked by Pretty Blue Fox Games (Bhagpuss)]
    • Now has a score of 75.0

So Bhagpuss saw some benefit this week.  Not enough to change his position on the board, but at least there are more scores listed in his column.

At that point we had two more titles on tap for the week and on Wednesday scores started to appear for those, starting with Order of the Sinking Star.

Order of the Sinking Star

Picked by Ula, that came in with a solid score.

  • Order of the Sinking Star
    • [Picked by Anthania Interactive (Ula)]
    • Now has a score of 81.6

It even got a bit of a midday boost as more scores landed.

  • Order of the Sinking Star
    • [Picked by Anthania Interactive (Ula)]
    • Score has gone UP from 81.5 to 82.9

That meant when evening came and it was marked as release, Ula bounced up to first place once more.

  • Publisher Score Updates
    • Anthania Interactive (Ula)
      • Score has gone UP from 102.1 to 115.0
      • Moved from 4th place to 1st place
    • Rodent Entertainment (Arhanta)
      • Moved from 1st place to 2nd place
    • TAGN HQ (Wilhelm)
      • Moved from 2nd place to 3rd place
    • S Class Warfare Studios (p0tsh0t)
      • Moved from 3rd place to 4th place

Ula wasn’t very far out in front.  With the gap less than half a point between first and second place, “skin of her teeth” might be the apt metaphor.

Ula out front by less than half a point

And that was not going to last for long because the score was already in for the final title of the week, Dragon’s Dogma 2: Dark Arisen.

Dragon’s Dogma II: Dark Arisen

Picked by Arhanta, its initial score suggested that Ula’s reign would be short indeed.

  • Dragon’s Dogma 2: Dark Arisen
    • [Picked by Rodent Entertainment (Arhanta)]
    • Now has a score of 87.3

Score updates showed it wavering a bit.

  • Dragon’s Dogma 2: Dark Arisen
    • [Picked by Rodent Entertainment (Arhanta)]
    • Score has gone DOWN from 86.4 to 85.3

But that was not enough to stave off the inevitable once it his its release moment.  Arhanta returned to first place after spending about a day in second.

  • Publisher Score Updates
    • Rodent Entertainment (Arhanta)
      • Score has gone UP from 114.3 to 129.4
      • Moved from 2nd place to 1st place
    • Anthania Interactive (Ula)
      • Moved from 1st place to 2nd place

Then, in Parthian shot at the end of the week, Bhagpuss took a bit of an arrow to the knee.

  • Nivalis Nights
    • [Picked by Pretty Blue Fox Games (Bhagpuss)]
    • Score has gone DOWN from 75.0 to 73.8

Still above negative, but not much of a help this late in the season.

All of which left the scoreboard looking like this at the end of the week.

Week 41 Scores

The league projection changed up, demoting Shintar to a second place finish as Arhanta’s revised picks cleared a path to a potential league victory.

Of course, the league projection can be comically wrong at times.  Also, there are still things in play.  Arhanta has one pick left waiting for release next week.  That will seal their score.

Meanwhile, Shintar has three titles yet to release on her roster.  One is coming up, but the other two do not yet have dates nailed down.  Shintar still has $27 left of her budget to work out some additional picks.  Or maybe there is a trade to be had with somebody?

All I know is that there were no bids this week.

There were, however, a couple of updates.  One of the many Warhammer titles got a firm date.

  • Warhammer Survivors
    • [Picked by Rusty Shackleford (Shilgrod)]
    • Release date changed from ‘2026’ to ‘Tuesday, November 10, 2026’.

Who cares about GTA VI, do it!

Meanwhile, At Fate’s End was pushed out to 2027.

  • At Fate’s End
    • [Picked by Crash and Burn Games (Shawn)]
    • Estimated release date changed from ‘2026’ to ‘2027’.

So I expect there will be some bids soon.

That left the next ten upcoming titles as follows.

Week 42 Coming Up

As for week forty-two, we have another four release week as we race to the end of the year.

The last league pick with a date is Professor Layton and the New World of Steam, which is slated for December 10th.  I am sure other things could come into play between then and the new year, score changes and some final reviews landing, but there are currently no titles allowed in the league set to ship after December 10th.

We’ll see how that wraps up.

Related:

  • TAGN Fantasy Critic League
  • TAGN Discord Server
  • Fantasy Critic Site
  • Fantasy Critic How to Play
  • Fantasy Critic FAQ
  • Fantasy Critic Most Desired Reviews
  • Open Critic Review Site