Skip to main content

Flock launches this July, and you can watch its hypnotic new trailer here

A character flies on a bird in Flock.
Annapurna Interactive
Summer Gaming Marathon Feature Image
This story is part of our Summer Gaming Marathon series.

Publisher Annapurna Interactive’s next title, Flock, has a new summer release date. The oddball nature-classification game will launch on July 16 for PS4, PS5, Xbox One, Xbox Series X/S, and PC via Steam. It will launch as part of Xbox Game Pass on that date, too.

Flock is the latest game from Richard Hogg and Hollow Ponds, the indie team behind Wilmot’s Warehouse and I Am Dead. It’s a cozy exploration game where players ride through the skies on the back of a bird and categorize different animals. Digital Trends has an exclusive release date trailer for the game, which gives a glimpse of what players will do in the world.

The two-minute trailer plays like a calming nature documentary, with a David Attenborough-like voice narrating Flock‘s gameplay. It emphasizes the core gameplay loop: finding critters, using songs to charm them, and flying alongside them once tamed. It also highlights the role of hover sheep, which can create wool that’s used to craft cosmetic hats.

Digital Trends demoed Flock last December at a Day of the Devs event during The Game Awards. At the time, I complimented the game’s relaxing nature identification gameplay loop and its silly sense of humor. “While my demo would only give me a taste of its central progression, tasking me with identifying a certain number of creatures or courting them to fly alongside me, that was enough to know I’ll be taking to the skies when it launches next spring,” I wrote at the time (Flock‘s release date would later move to summer 2024).

Flock launches on July 16 for PS4, PS5, Xbox One, Xbox Series X/S, and PC via Steam.

Giovanni Colantonio
Giovanni is a writer and video producer focusing on happenings in the video game industry. He has contributed stories to…
Riven’s upcoming remake is only happening because Cyan can do it justice
The observatory in the remake of Riven.

A remake of Riven: The Sequel to Myst, a PC puzzle game classic, comes PC, Mac, Meta Quest 2, and Meta Quest 3 later this month. Recreating such a beloved game is a daunting task for any developer. In an interview with Digital Trends, Rand Miller from Cyan Worlds, the studio behind the original Riven and this remake, explained that the studio tactfully waited to revisit Riven until they could get it right.

"Riven is such a special part of Cyan's history. We knew we would remake it for real-time 3D at some point, but not until we could really do it justice," Miller tells Digital Trends. "We have done several remakes of Myst, along with several other new games, which allowed us to test the 3D engine waters and get better and better at our real-time 3D skills. The stars seemed like they would align a few years ago so we began design."

Read more
This Miyazaki-inspired survival game lets you heal the environment
Person flying on green glider toward floating island in cloudy sky

Aloft gets its name from its floating archipelago, where you (and up to eight friends) are the only people left in an otherwise abandoned world. Like BitCraft, which I previewed during this year's  Game Developers Conference, it focuses on an interactive environment where players have to give in order to get. However, Aloft adds to the world-building with "healing," which will rebuild and nurture cursed islands. At Summer Game Fest, I attended a hands-off preview where I spoke with developers about their inspirations and watched them fight evil mushrooms to save the environment.

After 30 minutes, Aloft gave the impression of a survival game with a solid gameplay loop of cleansing hundreds of islands, designing your own home, and discovering new pieces of the world's mysterious history. As players glide between islands, they might find a few with dark auras that indicate infestation. There, they fight against monsters using weapons like axes and bows. Often, the core infestation manifests as a thick root that spawns hostile fungi-inspired enemies. Once players defeat them and rid the island of the cursed root, the dark aura disappears and it becomes lush again.

Read more
New mainline Shovel Knight game will bring a ‘new dimension’ to the series
Shovel Knight with his weapon standing in front of a night sky with a full moon.

Now enterting its second decade of existence, the Shovel Knight series is getting some major updates, including a whole new mainline game that was announced Friday.

Yacht Club Games founder Sean Velasco didn't reveal much during the studio's 10th anniversary showcase, but said the game, which has been in the works for around four years, "honors the shovel knight legacy" while integrating "innovative gameplay mechanics." This is purposefully vague, but his statement that it'll be a "bold new adventure that'll launch Shovel Knight into an entirely new dimension of gaming" makes us think that 3D might be on the horizon.

Read more