PAX East

Digital Reality and Grasshopper Manufacture have already shown the world that a developer in Hungary can work together with a studio in Japan to deliver a fantastic shoot ’em up with Sine Mora. Now they’re fast on their way to proving it was no fluke as the duo enter what Digital Reality Director of Publishing Balázs Horváth says are the final few months of development work on Black Knight Sword before it launches this summer. It likely won’t be the last time they team up, either. When asked if the two would work together on a game again in the future, Horváth smiled and said only: “Yes.”

As for Black Knight Sword, it’s something very different from their last collaborative work. The studios have left the bright blue skies behind and turned their attention to a dark and dreary fantasy setting. It’s the result of Grasshopper’s unique approach to story conceptualization being funneled through the creative minds over at Digital Reality. What that amounts to is an opening sequence with a man — a man hanging by his neck. His suicide attempt doesn’t quite come to fruition, however. Instead he ends up grabbing the hilt of a mysterious sword that transforms this sad and mysterious soul into the equally mysterious Black Knight.

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What we are playing is a weekly column published on Sunday. Various members of the team let the world know which games have had them hooked over the past week …
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Were you stuck at home this while your gamer friends partied at PAX this weekend? Well dry those eyes, for Gamespot have compiled a neat video showcasing five of …
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Star Trek’s John de Lancie has picked up his next generation starring role in the upcoming first person puzzler Quantum Conundrum from Airtight Games. Best known for playing Q …
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Sonic the Hedgehog: 4: Episode 1 didn’t exactly spin dash to fan’s hearts when it released in 2010–it contained a wonky physics engine and lackluster gameplay, but Sega plans to turn that perception around with its aptly titled sequel Sonic the Hedgehog 4: Episode 2.

The demo we played at PAX East had Sonic speeding through an act covered in blizzard conditions with huge snowballs gaining mass while fumbling toward our blue protagonist, so it was important that Sega’s promise to include retro physics and more refined gameplay were included to overcome the demo’s obstacles.

Sega has succeeded so far, sort of. The most obvious inclusion, the ability to harness Tails’ hovering skills to carry the grounded Sonic to distance ledges makes for an enjoyable distraction, but once vertical the overbearing weight of Sonic becomes apparent. He still needs more momentum to maintain a steady speed than his incarnations in the 90s, and any and all gameplay distractions like dropping straight down from flying high with Tails just makes Sonic seem heavier than a Hummer.

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Find out what developers and publishers the XBLA Fans team will meet with at PAX East
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After spending the last four years releasing a multitude of sequels and spin-offs for its popular Rock Band and Dance Central franchises, Cambridge-based Harmonix Music Systems is scaling things back a bit with its next release. The next Harmonix-developed title the world will get is still part of the Rock Band series, but it will arrive at some point this summer sans the band. On Tuesday the developer unveiled Rock Band Blitz — a single-player XBLA and PSN game that rocks out without rock instruments, instead requiring the use of a regular controller for solo-jamming along all five instrumental tracks at once.

The simplicity of the concept isn’t exactly in line with what fans have come to expect from the company that popularized plastic instruments, so it’s understandable if there is some hesitation from the community to accept this new direction. Project Director Matthew Nordhaus explanation during my trip to the developer’s studio that the team’s goal is to release a product that removes the series’ high barriers of entry through a more simplistic approach probably won’t have plastic rock stars pumped for the big show either. Read a few quick-and-dirty details on the internet and watch a quick clip of Blitz‘ gameplay and you might get the impression that this is just another case of a developer dumbing its game down for modern gamers who are, supposedly, unable to process complexity in their video games. Well, guess what? It’s not.

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Deadlight‘s gameplay is a combination of 2D platforming with some action elements and survival horror elements. But in this new trailer, we see all the environments a post-apocalyptic 1986 …
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Two is always better than one — except, of course, when it’s not. Whether it actually is or not in developer Demiurge’s Shoot Many Robots is a topic that is open to no small amount of debate. In fact, there is so much disagreement as to whether the game’s current single-stick controls or a more modernized dual analog scheme — which is not currently an option available to players — is best, that the Boston-based studio has decided to host what it’s dubbing the “Control Scheme Throwdown” at PAX East in April.

A special build of the XBLA title will be playable at the dev’s booth during the show (April 6—8) that is going to enable play with the power of not just one but two analog sticks. Attendees who wish to participate will be pitted against players using a single stick in a competition to help Demiurge decide whether or not to patch in support for the additional stick. Should the team reach the decision to do so , the control style employed by the PAX competition’s winner will become the standard once the option is added. The gauntlet — it has been thrown down.

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Weekly Roundup compiles all the biggest news stories, reviews, and releases from the week into one handy post on the weekends

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