Kotaku’s Weekend Guide: 5 Great Games We Can’t Wait To Get Back To

As the holiday week winds to a close, some of us on the east coast of the United States are patiently awaiting a few inches of snow (and hopefully not rain). I’m probably not alone in looking forward to a quiet weekend in which I can hopefully carve out an hour or two of relaxing game time before the end-of-year parties and the race back to the grindstone in 2026. If you’re looking for recommendations of what to play, here’s what we at Kotaku are making time for this weekend. Cast n Chill Play it on: PC, Switch (Switch 2 edition also available) Goal: Catch the legendary King Salmon of Safety Cove It’s that strange, liminal week between Christmas and New Year’s, a time when many of us, myself included, seem possessed of a desire to do as little as possible. And as if intended specifically to fill this niche, Cast n Chill has recently arrived on Switch and Switch 2, letting me play something when I want to play something and also not play something when I literally don’t want to do anything at all. See, Cast n Chill is a fishing game with an idle mode; if you don’t feel like actively playing it yourself, you can just have your little pixel-art fisherman work the rod and the reel all by himself, catching some fish and selling them for cash so that, when you do come back to the game, you’ve got some more money to spend in the bait and tackle shop on new fishing rods, boats, licenses, and so forth. But what really makes Cast n Chill so pleasant is, well, how chill it is, whether you’re actively playing or not. The landscapes surrounding its various fishing spots are remarkably picturesque and dense with detail, and the sounds of nature that accompany your time on these tranquil lakes and rivers are so soothing that hearing them play in the background while I sit here working at my desk makes me feel like some small part of me is out there on the water, too. Of course, time spent playing Cast n Chill is screentime, but it also feels like a real reminder that there’s a whole world of gorgeous forests, clear lakes, and big starry skies to enjoy, and that sometimes just taking all that beauty in is a better use of our time than anything that might show up on a productivity spreadsheet. - Carolyn Petit Unbeatable Play it on: PC, PS5, Xbox Goal: Give it a second chance As end-of-year season wraps up, I’m thinking back on a game I played and soured on pretty quickly: Unbeatable . The anime-inspired rhythm game’s opening hours felt poorly tutorialized and its music wasn’t grabbing me, but now that I’ve got some time, I feel like if any game I played this year deserved a charitable second shot, it was this one. I love rhythm games, doing crimes, and Unbeatable ‘s punk aesthetic. Even if its story...

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