Weird Games Getting Weird Sequels

 

I live for weird niche shit.  I don't care if I need to dig through Steam suggestion queues for hours on end or digging through the aisles of a retro game store, I love filling my game libraries with weird crap that no ones played and no one cares about other than me and a few other weirdos.  So imagine my surprise when I'm going through my Steam suggestions only to find that a curio game from my earlier years or something I never hear anyone talking about ever gets a new release in the current year.  I want to shine a light on these newer games so that hopefully I can convince a few more people to try the same weird shit that I like, here we go 

1. Radirgy Swag

Radirgy is a arcade shmup from 2005 that made its way to the Dreamcast and the Gamecube later down the line.  It was Japan only but its built up a bit of a following with shmup fans thanks to its unique artstyle, bangin' OST and interesting gameplay loop that involves slicing things up like its 2am in central London.  

Surprisingly, it got a couple of sequels which I think are both on the Nintendo Switch although if my understanding is correct, the English version of Swag got delisted due to license issue.  I was pretty shocked, then, to find that on the 4th of March 2026, Swag got released to Steam and for 10 bucks and even you can play it right now.  Radirgy 2 is still MIA on PC but apparently you can get it on Switch and PS4.  I'm not sure if thats true for places that aren't Japan but if it is, go check that out too

This is the most normal one of the games I'm about to cover since the original was a shmup and its sequels are also shmups.  Good games too, I'd suggest playing the first one on and emulator for either DC or Gamecube to see if you gel with it and then dropping some support for this game on Steam if you do.  

2. Slave Zero X 

Slave Zero is a 3rd person shooter from 1999 where you control a big ass robot shooting other big ass robots.  This is one I never finished myself since I only ever had the Dreamcast demo of the thing but there's a user on YouTube called pmcTRILOGY who has done speedruns of it that I've enjoyed watching.  One I need to bump up the backlog priority list for sure.  It's a game that I think very few people are actually aware of.  I can maybe think of one other person that I know who is aware of what Slave Zero is and I'm not certain he's actually played it for himself, like he just knows it exists

So then in 2024 it got a weird followup game called Slave Zero X.  X is not another 3rd person shooter about big ass robots like you might expect but instead a 2D side scrolling sprite based character action game.  Inspirations for its designed cited on the store page are Devil May Cry, Strider and Guilty Gear.  Guilty Gear.  Funnily enough, when I saw the Steam page for this first time around its launch the first thing my brain went to was Blazblue because the main character is a dead ringer for Hakumen from that game. 

I can't speak to its quality since I've not played it for myself but it honestly looks really cool.  If you're into that style of game then it might be worth checking out.  Its price tag is a little high at 20.99 which is why I have not purchased it for myself yet but hardcore character action fans looking for a fix might be willing to drop that.  I'm personally gonna either wait for a sale or a significantly reduced backlog and I'm certain the former will come first.  

3. Baroque: Become A Meta Being: Revive

Baroque is a strange game originally released in 1998 for the Sega Saturn exclusively in Japan and is probably one of my favorite games on the system.  It got a remake that actually released in the west for the PS2 and Wii but it's quite different from the original version and just not quite as good.  So with that combo of Japan only game on an obscure system along side a sub standard remake that got mixed reviews, Baroque was doomed to the curio dimension.  

So when I was going through my steam discovery queue one evening imagine how hard my jaw hit the fucking floor when I saw Baroque: Become a Meta Being crossed my path being a game that apprently released in December of 202 mother fucking 5. 

If you have not seen or heard of Baroque then the quick description is that it's a sort of first person real time dungeon crawling roguelike kind of like mystery dungeon but not really.  That's not a good description but at the very least you can get a vague idea of what I'm on about.  So what kind of game do you think this is?  If you said "oh, another dungeon crawler of course" then you lose 10 points and get bonked on the head because its a fucking FROGGER CLONE.  This isn't close to the first time the series has had a spinoff that's out of left field like this but man, all I want is more weird dungeon crawling and instead I get this shit.  

Actually, having not played it I can't say for certain that its shit.  I don't actually like Frogger all that much but I'm such a slut for Baroque that I'm basically forced to at least give it a go.  I'll go in with an open mind and maybe I too can hop my way into becoming a Meta Being. 

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All of this makes me wonder if there are other weird curio games from my past that have recent or semi-recent sequels or spinoffs just hiding out there on Steam or some other storefront somewhere.  Is there are Jade Cocoon 3 or something extremely similar hiding away somewhere?  Maybe a modern Mohawk and Headphone Jack I don't know about?  Or fuck it, after seeing that Baroque game there could be typing tutor based on The Granstream Saga for all I know.  I need to do more digging and I need to try these games and so do you.