SHOUT OUT - South of Midnight was a charming surprise that led the pack
We eating good tonight, baby.
By Jonathan Garrett
17/06/24
NOTE: thatHITBOX Shout Out’s are not sponsored content. They’re games, developers, individuals, or issues that we want to highlight and share purely out of interest.
There was already enough in that initial in-engine announcement teaser to suggest that South of Midnight was going to be something memorable. It might not have been immediately apparent exactly what type of game it was shaping up to be at the time, but the character design, music, and overall tone implied a crystal clear creative intent.
Cut to this years Xbox Showcase, and that big ol’ Catfish stole it. Mixing supernatural abilities with a deep southern aesthetic, Compulsion Games have demonstrated tremendous growth as a studio and appear to be more confident than ever. Seeing a meaningful sequence of gameplay that confirmed the third person view, the combat abilities that double up as traversal mechanics, and some delightful acting across the board sealed the deal.
South of Midnight is our Game of the Show. It’s a world we can’t wait to explore, and knowing that it’s a 2025 release helps avoid any over crowding towards the end of this year. If marketed right, it could be a fantastic advert for Game Pass, and the simultaneous PC release will hopefully see it finding a wider audience beyond console.
TARPS?
At the bottom of some of our articles, you’ll see a series of absurd looking images (with equally stupid, in joke laden names). These are the TARP badges, which represent our ‘Totally Accurate Rating Platform’. They allow us to identify specific things, recognise positive or negative aspects of a games design, and generally indulge our consistent silliness with some visual tomfoolery.
