Monaco 2, Stray Gods Headline 2022 Humble Games Lineup
Over the years, we've seen Humble Bundle transition from an organization arranging video game bundles for charity, to a digital storefront, to an indie game publisher in its own right. While the charity bundles and the digital storefront are still core focuses of Humble Bundle, the company's publishing arm has been growing as well. Today, Humble Games unveiled its slate of upcoming games for 2022, and there are certainly some surprises in the lineup.
Today's reveal was really something of a grab bag of announcements. Some titles were revealed for the very first time, others announced Humble Games as their publishing partner, while some previously-revealed games received release dates. On top of that, these games seem to cover a wide array of genres. In all, Humble released new details about 9 games in total, and it sounds like some of them won't even be out in 2022, as the company tells us these games are slated for "2022 and beyond."
Monaco 2 leads Humble's announcements
Perhaps the most surprising of the day's announcements was that of "Monaco 2." Announced nearly 10 years after the first game, "Monaco: What's Mine Is Yours," released, "Monaco 2" will serve up another round of co-op, top-down heists to complete with friends. Humble Games has actually acquired the rights to "Monaco" from its creator, Andy Schatz, who will be working with Pocketwatch Games on the sequel. There's no release date for "Monaco 2" yet, suggesting it's still a long way off, but you can check out the announcement trailer for the game above.
Humble also revealed today that it has entered a publishing agreement for "Stray Gods: The Roleplaying Musical." That is quite the title, and indeed, Humble bills this game as "one part narrative adventure and one part interactive musical." With Austin Wintory acting as composer and well-known voice actors Troy Baker and Laura Bailey lending their talents to the game, the finished product should be interesting if nothing else. Like "Monaco 2," there's no release date for "Stray Gods" yet, but Humble says more details are coming.
Third on the list of today's announcements is "Coral Island," which seems like it might take some inspiration from other life simulation games like "Stardew Valley," "My Time at Portia," and "Harvest Moon." The biggest difference between those games and "Coral Island" is that the latter takes place on a tropical island, where players are tasked with revitalizing the island's surrounding coral reefs. It sounds like an intriguing angle, but with no release date yet, we're not sure when we'll get to play it.
Even more indie game announcements
Joining "Monaco 2," "Stray Gods," and "Coral Island," is a slate of other indie games, starting with "Moonscars," from fledgling studio Black Mermaid. This is Black Mermaid's first game, and Humble will be acting as publisher on it. We even have a release window for this title — look for it to launch on PC in summer 2022.
Humble Games will also be working with Old Moon to publish "Ghost Song," which sounds like something of a Metroidvania mystery game. We got our first look at "Ghost Song," today, but unfortunately, no release window for it yet. The same is true of "Infinite Guitars," a new rhythm RPG made by Nikko Nikko that might be worth checking out for anyone nostalgic for the heyday of rhythm games.
Some titles that did get release dates (or at least release windows) include survival horror game "SIGNALIS" from developer rose-engine, which will be launching on PC and Xbox One this fall. In the more immediate future, we can look forward to the release of "Chinatown Detective Agency" from General Interactive Co., which will be launching on PC, Xbox One, and Nintendo Switch on April 7, 2022. It'll be joined shortly after by tactical RPG "The Iron Oath" from Curious Panda Games, which heads to PC early access on April 19, 2022.