Shinji Mikami
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Early PS4 classic The Evil Within will be free on the Epic Games Store next week
2014 horror classic will be one of the free titles on the Epic Games Store from October 19 to 26.
Game designer Shinji Mikami is leaving the Bethesda studio he founded
Shinji Mikami, the game designer behind early Resident Evil games and 'Ghostwire: Tokyo,' is leaving the studio he founded.
Joystiq Streams: Discovering The Evil Within
The Evil Within, much as it is in the human psyche, has proven mercurial and divisive. Is The Evil Within born evil? Or was it just raised that way? The only way to find out is to make more and more people confront The Evil Within on its own terms, much like we're going to force horror gaming fanatic Richard Mitchell (@TheRichardM) to do on today's stream. Some of Richard's favorite games include Amnesia, Resident Evil, and even deep cuts like Fatal Frame 4 and Silent Hill: Shattered Memories. His history with the genre is vast and he'll be playing The Evil Within completely blind for the very first time on Joystiq.com/Twitch at 4PM EST. Joystiq.com/Twitch broadcasts live action every Tuesday and Thursday at 4PM EST, but we're going to be streaming horror games almost every day over the next two weeks so make sure to follow us on Twitch to know when we go live. [Images: Bethesda]
Tour the eerie world of The Evil Within in its new trailer
In this nearly three-and-a-half minute trailer, publisher Bethesda Softworks introduces players to the dark world of Shinji Mikami's The Evil Within, complete with bloody corpses, improvised weaponry and enemies that would be right at home in your most horrific nightmares. [Image: Bethesda Softworks]
The Evil Within pushed up to Oct. 14 for early scares
Sometimes fear sneaks up on you. News from QuakeCon – via the game's official Twitter account – reveals that The Evil Within, the upcoming horror game from Resident Evil mastermind Shinji Mikami, is now launching on October 14 for PlayStation 4, PlayStation 3, Xbox One, Xbox 360 and PC. The date shift brings the game forward in our calendar, a week earlier than the game's originally expected October 21 release date. The Evil Within, in development at the ZeniMax-owned studio Tango Gameworks, was originally set to scare gamers at the end of August before moving to October. Thankfully, the game won't arrive on October 7, which is already a terrifying date for everyone's wallet. [Image: Bethesda]
Japanese gamers can play The Evil Within unedited with 'Gore Mode' DLC
While the retail version of Bethesda's The Evil Within will hit Japan in a censored state compared to other regions, Japanese players will have the option of restoring the game to its full gory glory with add-on DLC available after launch, Famitsu reports (via Siliconera). Directed by Resident Evil creator Shinji Mikami, The Evil Within is a survival horror game that puts players at the scene of a recent mass murder, alone and ill-equipped to handle lurking creatures. ZeniMax Asia general manger Tetsu Takahashi notes that an edited Japanese release will earn a lower CERO content rating, allowing it to reach a wider audience. "If we were to make it the same way as the foreign version, it'd be rated CERO Z [18 and up] and we felt that it'd be best to release it the way the creators make it," Takahashi said, via Siliconera's translation. "However, that would limit the sales and advertising, so we'd lose the opportunity to reach out to as many customers possible." Downloadable copies of The Evil Within will be split between CERO D (17 and up) and CERO Z versions at launch, while the Japanese retail release is CERO D-only. Japan's "Gore Mode DLC" will restore The Evil Within's violent content, which will remain uncensored in the North American retail release launching on October 21. [Image: Bethesda]
Video preview: Taking a blood bath in The Evil Within
The above video preview potentially contains minor spoilers for The Evil Within. Watch at your own risk. In the underbelly of a rotting asylum, a generally unremarkable corridor shifts through the fabric of reality. Unfortunately, I'm in that corridor. So I look back for companions that were there a second ago but now are gone without trace. I realize I've no choice except to forge on, but when I do reality changes again, and I'm the other side of a door I didn't open. Mere seconds later, I'm wading through a basement that's literally overflowing with blood and guts. A minute after that a hooded spirit appears, opens his arms wide, and melts into a thousand little red spheres that slither into the crimson lake and awaken a small undead army. As the zombies advance on me in this swimming pool from hell, I try to reflect on how I got here. Wasn't it only a few minutes ago that I was leisurely exploring the grounds, gunning down the odd zombie here and there? How had that light stroll transformed into the river Styx so quickly?
The Evil Within scares up August 26 launch date
The Evil Within will launch August 26 in North America and August 29 in Europe, Bethesda announced today. The latest from esteemed Resident Evil creator Shinji Mikami, The Evil Within will arrive on PC, Xbox One, PS4, Xbox 360 and PS3. The Evil Within casts players as Detective Sebastian Castellanos, who's investigating the scene of a mass-murder before being ambushed and knocked unconscious, waking to a deranged world full of gruesome creatures. The game was first announced in April 2013 and is developed by Tango Gameworks, a Japan-based division of ZeniMax Asia founded in March 2010 by Mikami. Our hands-off demo of the game at E3 2013 saw the immediate impact of Mikami's direction. [Image: Bethesda Softworks]
Why Mikami shifted Resident Evil from horror to action
There is a clear line of delineation within the Resident Evil series that splits the games into either the survival-horror camp of the originals, or the more action-focused affairs of Resident Evil 4 and beyond. Series creator Shinji Mikami says this switch in tone was fueled by the reception of the Resident Evil remake for the GameCube. "The Resident Evil remake is actually one of my favorites of the series too. But it didn't sell very well," creator Shinji Mikami tells IGN. "Maybe there weren't many people ready to accept that. Because of the reaction to the Resident Evil remake, I decided to work more action into Resident Evil 4. Resident Evil 4 would have been a more scary, horror-focused game if the remake had sold well." Resident Evil 4 has been displayed to the public in (at least) two distinct forms. There's the Resident Evil 4 we all know and love, but prototype video suggests an experience akin to the slow, hulking pace of the original games. "That all came out of the commercial failure of the Resident Evil remake. And then of course Resident Evil 4 sold really well," Mikami says. "I have kind of a lingering trauma there, because the Resident Evil remake didn't sell – much more than people would think."
The (Resident) Evil Within
Shinji Mikami's creative influence on The Evil Within is immediately apparent. Mechanically, my brief hands-off E3 demo had a lot in common with Mikami's survival horror milestone, Resident Evil 4. The over-the-shoulder camera, slow pacing and pulse-quickening enemies were all there. That The Evil Within shares so much with Resident Evil 4 is a two-sided proposition. Resident Evil 4 was one of the greatest games of its day, but its ground has been retread many times by subsequent survival horror games over the years, and even by Mikami himself in Shadows of the Damned. Where The Evil Within seems to stake its greatest claim is in its visual and thematic elements. The game stars a detective named Sebastian – Seb to his friends – who is sent to investigate a disturbance at a mental hospital. An unknown event has claimed the lives of several patients and possibly a few police officers.%Gallery-191139%
The Evil Within protagonist makes do without 'extraordinary powers'
The Evil Within won't empower the player beyond "appropriate" weaponry and a delicate dearth of ammunition, claims Director Shinji Mikami."We're not giving the player really any extraordinary powers," he told IGN, "but we don't want to go in the opposite direction and not give them any means of fighting back – that would violate the rules of survival horror. So we're looking at appropriate types of weapons with a limited amount of ammunition in order to get them through ... if they're good."The Evil Within follows a detective named Sebastian, an unfortunate soul summoned to a distorted, labyrinthine asylum crawling with creepy things. Mikami sees the premise as a source of proper scares, and frames it in an overtly cinematic way – right down to the survival-horror game's wider aspect ratio of 2.35:1. (As with some films, this means you'll see black bars above and below the image on HDTVs, which are typically in 16:9 ratio.)Mikami's approach is reflected, arguably to a fault, in a live-action trailer for The Evil Within. If you have trouble stomaching the more grotesque parts, just substitute the gore for gourmet foods. The gnarled corpse becomes chicken, and the final shot is spaghetti escaping confinement in a microwave.
'The Evil Within,' Mikami's new survival horror game, announced
Bethesda has announced The Evil Within, the new name for Resident Evil creator Shinji Mikami's Zwei. The game will launch on Xbox 360, PS3, PC and "next generation consoles" in 2014.Mikami's Tango Gameworks studio was purchased by Bethesda Softworks parent company Zenimax Media back in 2010. Project Zwei was announced in April of last year.
Bethesda teases first concept of Mikami's 'Zwei,' explains what 'pure survival horror' means
After Tango Gameworks head and veteran game dev Shinji Mikami outed news on his current game, "Project Zwei," to Famitsu earlier this week, publisher Bethesda apparently decided to do its own big debut. In an email missive early this morning, Bethesda announced Mikami's project as "the realization of *pure* survival horror" (Bethesda's asterisks, not ours), and included a collage of various environments in Zwei, "that communicate the tone and direction that the production is taking."Mikami said true survival horror is a situation "in which the player confronts and overcomes fear." From that note, we can only assume that the Black Eyed Peas must play some role in Zwei. Mikami added, "I've found my focus and once again I'm striving for pure survival horror. I am being very hands-on in the development of this game to ensure that the quality is there. Rest assured."As reported earlier, the game is still in the initial stages of development (as evidenced by the collage of environments above). It's expected to launch on "HD consoles" at some point in 2013.
Resident Evil's Mikami welcomes Bethesda to the world of survival horror
Nope, it's not Billy Corgan's next group – "Project Zwei" is actually Resident Evil creator Shinji Mikami's first project from his Bethesda Softworks-supported Tango Gameworks. The name (codename?) of Mikami's project was revealed to Famitsu in a recent interview (interpreted by Andriasang, via Sokuho), wherein Mikami says the game will be of the survival horror variety, drawing on his past work with the Resident Evil series.The interview also reveals that the game is still rather early in development – not entirely unexpected for a game not due for at least another year – and that Mikami is content in his relationship with Maryland-based publisher Bethesda Softworks.Little else is known about the title, with Mikami only saying that the game is intended for "HD consoles." As for the name? "Zwei" is tied to the German for "two," but Mikami says the name has no connection to the game's content.
Expect Shinji Mikami's next game in 2013 or beyond
In December last year we predicted that Shinji Mikami's Zenimax-owned development studio, Tango, wouldn't produce any actual products within the next year -- on account of all the free Skyrim it received -- and it looks like we were right.Mikami told 4Gamer, as translated by Andriasang, that Tango would not launch any games in 2012, but leave itself a rather wide berth for producing something after 2013. The new, unannounced title uses an external engine, but it has been customized to the point that it is almost an internal one, Mikami said, leaving out any other specifics about the game. He did note that Skyrim "stimulated him as a creator," though.
How Resident Evil 2 helped Keiji Inafune become the indie dev he is today
Back in the mid-90s, now acclaimed Japanese developer Shinji Mikami was passionately toiling away on the first game in a soon-to-be hit franchise: Resident Evil. It was to be published by Capcom, but the company had reservations about the new intellectual property -- so much so that it nearly canned the project outright. Ex-Capcom global head of production Keiji Inafune recalled his side of the story during an impassioned GDC 2012 speech yesterday.Inafune claims he watched from the outside as Capcom's support for Resident Evil faded, and while he worked on other titles within the same company. Mikami fought for the fledgling game, eventually getting it published for Sony's PlayStation. The rest, of course, is zombie-ridden history.When Capcom began work on a sequel, Inafune says he got himself involved in a production role. "While Mikami focused on the game, as the producer, it was my mission to sell this title to as many people around the world," he said to a room full of attendees. But with the massive success of the first RE title, Inafune's role as salesman was relegated to a cake walk. "With my previous title Mega Man Legends, it was pretty challenging to even book a round of press appointments. No one was interested in hearing about a new Mega Man title," Inafune said. "However, the scenario was completely different with RE2. Once we announced the project, the requests poured in."
Shinji Mikami's studio gets Skyrim shipment, may never get any work done now
Former Capcom superstar Shinji Mikami formed the development studio Tango last year, and it has yet to produce a tangible product -- and after this generous gift from sibling company Bethesda Game Studios, we shouldn't expect any progress for another year or so. Bethesda, part of the Zenimax Group with Tango, sent one Skyrim collector's edition for every employee at Mikami's studio, which, as we can see in the photo, is more than two. Tango is based in Tokyo, but Bethesda sent over English versions of Skyrim because there is no collector's edition for the Japanese version, and because people in countries that aren't the U.S. generally know more than one language. They call it globalization. Weird.
Suda and Mikami get silly in Shadows of the Damned dev diary
Watch as famous game designers Goichi Suda and Shinji Mikami pretend to strangle each another, act like zombies and generally goof off. The point? They're promoting Shadows of the Damned, the new survival-horror title they're co-developing for EA. Oh, there's plenty of gameplay footage in here, too.
Shadows of the Damned preview: Hardly Hell
As the tall, blood-covered Frankenstein doppleganger leapt from a gigantic flame in the middle of a courtyard, I thought to myself, "Man, this guy could really use a bath." The shock set in when the demon reached into his own chest and ripped out its heart, then ate it, causing him to transform into a gigantic beast-man with a grotesque wolf's head. Howling at the moon, he summoned forth a mouthless steed covered in blood and rotting skin. Mounting his hell ride, he then conjured a trident and spear from the ether and set his sights on me. If there's one thing I can say about the brief 15-minute Shadows of the Damned demo I played this week, it's that the game isn't short on crazy. Also, I wish I got to kill that demon and the disfigured horse he rode in on. %Gallery-121868%
Shadows of the Damned launching on June 21, 2011
At a recent event in San Francisco, Suda 51 from Grasshopper Manufacture announced the new launch date for Shadows of the Damned: June 21. That gives it two weeks to get out of E3's way (the game was originally scheduled for June 7). Shadows of the Damned is a bizarre, horror-themed third-person shooter coming from EA Partners and a trio of well-known Japanese developers. If the names Shinji Mikami (Resident Evil), Suda 51 (No More Heroes) and Akira Yamaoka (Silent Hill composer) don't ring any bells, then you really have no idea just how weird this game is going to be.
