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Platinum’s Atsushi Inaba: “Everyone loves chainsaws”
May 16, 2008
Sega rolled out the red carpet—and the jumbo shrimp and Kobe beef burgers—to welcome Platinum Games as a development partner. Sega will publish four upcoming games from the acclaimed Japanese developer. In addition to announcing the names and platforms for the first three titles—MadWorld for Wii, Bayonetta for Xbox 360 and PlayStation 3 and Infinite Line for Nintendo DS (the fourth remains a mystery), Sega brought in the games’ creators to shed some light on these 2009 releases.
The only game that Sega offered both a quick trailer and a short playable demo of was the Mature-rated Madworld. The game’s producer, Atsushi Inaba, called the game “light-hearted and comical” as he controlled the main character, Jack, through the black-and-white world. Anyone 17 or older, according to the ESRB, that is.
“We chose to use historic black-and-white graphics to better emphasize the blood, although we didn’t want a perverse take on violence,” said Inaba through a translator. “We aimed for a comical, over-the-top take on violence that anyone can enjoy.”
The blood flows excessively in this game and literally fills the in-game camera. Jack comes equipped with a chainsaw on his right arm and he uses that to slice through enemies. Inaba said “everyone loves chainsaws” in games. Jack also uses the environment to take down enemies, including “rose bushes,” the name given to a row of spikes that protrude from walls in the game. The demo showed Jack impaling one particularly unlucky enemy over and over again on the same bloody spike.
Other gameplay originals include the ability to toss garbage bags at enemies to stun them—it’s the smell of those bags that makes them dizzy. There are also an assortment of bloodbath challenges throughout the game. Inaba showed off Man Darts, which allows Jack to walk softly but carry a big stick. That stick is used to whack an assortment of enemies through the air and impale them (or pieces of them) on a giant dart board complete with points associated with each ring. The bat was dripping with blood by the end of this mini-game.
“We felt the Wii was missing this type of game from its line-up,” said Inaba. And we agree. Resident Evil 4 proved that quality M-rated content can succeed on a Nintendo platform, and this game’s unique look and gameplay certainly can’t be called anything but original.
Bayonetta is a new action game directed by Hideki Kamiya, the creator of Devil May Cry. Set in a world where witches battle angels, the game’s protagonist, Bayonetta, a witch, can wield four guns at once—one in each hand and one on each foot. In addition, she has magical abilities to take out enemies. After showing a very short trailer of the game we posted here, Kamiya promised to take action games forward and fulfill the promise of 3D action.
Infinite Line is the first role-playing game set in space for Nintendo DS. Players can build a starship from over 150 modular parts, pick a crew from 200 individuals and then set off to explore two entire galaxies in a massive story. Fans of classic space exploration games like Star Control will even be able to control multiple starships at one time.
–John Gaudiosi
Tags: Atushi Inaba, Madworld, Platinum
