A big welcome back to all Loot Happens subscribers. Loot Happens is a weekly newsletter that is emailed and posted on LootHappens.com.
It's important to note that for premium subscribers, game offerings and in-game content, every week is different. Sometimes it's in-game codes, Steam keys, and giveaways, but premium members will always get something special every mailing. We also occasionally get mind-blowing early access or premium games that pay for an entire year's subscription.
Each newsletter is generally structured as Premium Loot > Free Sub Giveaways > Game Feature > Game discounts.
Key Giveaway For Premium Subscribers - Choose Your Game!
Impulsion
Impulsion is a fast-paced first-person platformer built around momentum, precision, and mastering physics under pressure. Armed with dual force-field guns that can speed up or slow down both yourself and the environment, you race through increasingly difficult obstacle courses that demand sharp reflexes and constant experimentation. Beneath the sci-fi setting and surprisingly playful dialogue, the game becomes a relentless test of movement mastery, especially once competitive leaderboards and speedrun modes push every second to matter.
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Psycho Wolf
Psycho Wolf is a bizarre stealth-action game that mixes retro 2.5D visuals inspired by early 3D titles with surprisingly tactical gameplay centered around hunting cartoonish animal enemies. Playing as the mysterious Psycho Wolf, you sneak through dangerous levels filled with fast and aggressive foes, using bushes for cover, crafting traps and camouflage, stealing valuables, and carefully planning attacks instead of simply charging into combat. Between its weird humor, looter-style progression, mansion upgrades, and intentionally strange aesthetic, Psycho Wolf feels like a chaotic blend of old-school stealth games and absurd indie experimentation. We know some early subscribers got this game in 2024, but we're giving new subscribers a chance to get it too.
Esoteric Ebb: Key Giveaway For Free Subscribers
Esoteric Ebb is a bizarre, dialogue-heavy CRPG that blends tabletop chaos with surreal fantasy noir, casting you as a deeply dysfunctional cleric investigating a deadly explosion days before a historic election. Set in the strange arcanepunk city of Norvik, the game leans heavily into branching choices, dice-roll encounters, and constant conversations with the competing voices inside your own head, turning even simple interactions into unpredictable roleplaying disasters. Between debating drunk sphinxes, manipulating factions, and using reality-bending magic to pry into secrets or control minds, Esoteric Ebb feels less like a traditional RPG and more like an unhinged tabletop campaign where failure is often far more entertaining than success.
If you would like to be in the running for a key, hit reply and just put 'esoteric'. We will pick a winner and send over the key in 48 hours
Schrödinger’s Call: Key Giveaway For Free Subscribers
Schrödinger’s Call is a quiet, melancholic story about regret, memory, and the final conversations people wish they could have before the end. Set mere nanoseconds before the moon crashes into Earth, the game follows Mary, a girl with no memories who becomes the “World’s Last Confidant,” answering phone calls from souls trapped between life and death. Each conversation unfolds like a small emotional vignette, exploring unfinished relationships, hidden fears, and the painful weight of things left unsaid, while the game’s soft picture-book presentation and reflective atmosphere turn the apocalypse into something deeply intimate rather than catastrophic.
If you would like to be in the running for a key, hit reply and just put 'call'. We will pick a winner and send over the key in 48 hours
Historically Low Prices
This section of Loot Happens currently tracks historical discounts on games and throughout the industry. Our tireless web crawlers scour the web daily, sniffing out the best deals across the gaming landscape.
These aren't just any games – they're titles we adore and highly respect. And right now, you can grab them at prices we've never seen before.
Palworld [PS5]
Collect all kinds of exciting Pals to fight, farm, build, and work for you.$29.99 $22.49
Subnautica [Nintendo Switch 2]
Descend into the depths of an alien underwater world.$29.99 $7.49
Outbound [Nintendo Switch 2]
Explore a colorful world and build your own cozy home on wheels.$24.99 $22.49
Mortal Kombat: Legacy Kollection [Nintendo Switch 2]
Step into the arena and choose your fighter.$49.99 $32.49
Featured Game Review: Yoshi and the Mysterious
There’s something fascinating about a game that constantly teases greatness just out of reach. Yoshi and the Mysterious Book is packed with imagination from the very beginning, throwing Yoshi into a storybook world filled with bizarre creatures, experimental mechanics, and open-ended stages built around curiosity rather than momentum. For a while, that sense of discovery is genuinely exciting. Every level introduces some new oddball species or playful interaction that makes you wonder what the next page might hold. But the deeper you get, the clearer it becomes that the game is far more interested in introducing ideas than developing them. What starts as a charming adventure slowly turns into a checklist-heavy scavenger hunt that rarely evolves beyond its first impressions, making the experience feel strangely shallow despite how creative it often looks.
The world is full of clever ideas
The biggest strength of Yoshi and the Mysterious Book is its creativity. Nearly every level revolves around a new creature with its own gimmick, whether it’s bouncing bubble creatures, giant drill-nosed beasts, or jellyfish that function like water jetpacks. Nintendo clearly had fun designing these weird little monsters, and discovering how they work gives the early hours a constant sense of surprise. Even simple experimentation rewards you with Discoveries, collectibles, and hidden interactions, making exploration feel playful and satisfying.
The level structure also helps the game stand out from older Yoshi titles. Instead of straightforward platforming, many stages feel more like miniature puzzle sandboxes with unique objectives. One level revolves around catching fish, another has you recovering stolen flowers, while others focus entirely on environmental interactions. That unpredictability keeps the adventure fresh for a long time, especially because the world itself is packed with charm and personality.
The depth never arrives
The problem is that most of these mechanics never evolve beyond their introduction. Once you’ve uncovered the majority of a level’s Discoveries, there’s very little reason to revisit it beyond completionism. The game constantly throws new ideas at you, but rarely combines them into deeper or more creative challenges. Instead of building complexity, it keeps resetting the formula with another gimmick-heavy stage, which gradually makes the adventure feel repetitive despite all its variety.
What makes this especially disappointing is that the game briefly reveals a far better version of itself late in the campaign. One standout level suddenly allows Yoshi to summon creatures from previous stages and creatively apply everything you’ve learned. It completely changes the game’s design philosophy and instantly becomes the most exciting part of the adventure. But almost as quickly as it appears, the mechanic disappears, and the game goes back to its usual structure. That missed opportunity ends up defining the entire experience.
Bottom Line
Yoshi and the Mysterious Book is charming, imaginative, and occasionally brilliant, but it rarely transforms its ideas into something truly substantial. The creature designs are wonderful, the world is full of personality, and the first half constantly surprises you with clever concepts. Yet the deeper you go, the more the adventure starts to feel mechanically thin. Its best mechanic arrives too late and vanishes too quickly, leaving behind a game that feels less like a fully realized journey and more like a collection of unfinished but fascinating experiments.
Next Week
Every newsletter has a lot to look forward to, and we are in active communication with several developers and studios. More to come next week!
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