Suda 51 seems to be a busy man these days. Previously it seemed like he and his team at Grasshopper Manufacture would focus on one game at a time due to their small size but that’s changed now. Next year Grasshopper is launching not just one, not two but three high profile games in the form of Shadows of the Damned for the PS3/360 and the Kinect exclusive Codename D, which is backed by Microsoft Game Studios and lastly the 3D shmup Sine Mora. But having three major games in development isn’t just enough for Suda as yet another new project has been announced.
The recently formed publisher Kadokawa Games has announced that Suda 51 will be overseeing a new project for them. The project, which is shrouded in mystery, will be one of the first core games Kadokawa has released. But being the cheeky guy that he is, Suda did reveal this interesting tidbit on his project as he said "I can't say anything concrete about this project yet, but I do guarantee that it'll feature stylish action and some really extreme twists. I showed the game off to an overseas publisher, and they couldn't stop laughing. I mean, just bending over and laughing. How many games do you know that can make you laugh like that?"
Besides having Suda oversee this project, it wasn’t mentioned just how involved Grasshopper will be in the development process. For example, Grasshopper is only involved with certain portions of Sine Mora’s development (music, design) while developer Digital Reality is handling the core duties.
Along with the reveal of Kadokawa’s project headed by Suda 51, the publisher also revealed a huge shocker: Sonic the Hedgehog creator Yuji Naka will be overseeing a project as well. Just like Suda’s project, details on what the father of Sonic is up to are sparse at the moment. But Yuji did reveal one key aspect of the game: it’ll take place in the sky. Speaking to Famitsu, Yuji said “The game itself is an action title that takes place in the sky. The action gameplay is what I'm focusing on the most with this project -- interactivity is the most important attraction with any sort of game, and if that doesn't evolve, then games won't be everything they can be. Sonic was all about completely taking over the land, and Nights brought that same concept into the skies. I had always thought that action games that take place in the sky are too hard for players to cope with, but then I thought up a new method for dealing with it.
Being a huge fan of Suda 51’s work I can’t wait to see what he has up his sleeve especially if his game is as ridiculous and comical as he makes it out to be. I’m also interested to see what Yuji Naka has cooking up since it’s been quite some time since he’s released a project. I’m all for action games taking place in the sky and based on his comments I wonder if his game may utilize the PlayStation Move or even the Kinect since he mentioned how he came up with a new method for dealing with sky based action mechanics.
When we can expect more substantial updates on Suda 51 and Yuji Naka’s projects wasn’t mentioned but one can hope for an impending Famitsu blowout in the near future.
[via 1up]
