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Don't stay away from this trailer
Away: Shuffle Dungeon looks like a very interesting game to us. The roulette-style mechanic of changing up the area in which the player is traversing looks to be one that will allow the game to keep things fresh and instill a feeling of tension in the player throughout their experience, creating an overall engaging piece of gaming. We're psyched for the game, to tell the truth.What about you all? Does this latest trailer for the game get you pumped for Away: Shuffle Dungeon? Does it not look like your kind of game?
Bad news for Away, good news for Blue Dragon
Publisher AQ Interactive announced that Blue Dragon Plus has been delayed until summer. But rather than being disappointed by this, we're quite delighted, because summer is much sooner than never. Mistwalker announced earlier this week that it had been delayed indefinitely, leading some to believe that might be shelved for good.Away: Shuffle Dungeon has also been delayed by AQ Interactive, resulting in somewhat of a different reaction. We were surprised to find that Blue Dragon Plus has a release date now after its presumed cancellation, but this delay was a reminder to us that Away had a release date at all. Back in October, Mistwalker said that Away would be out on January 31st, and in the latest scans you can just barely make out a February 28th date. We just didn't realize that it was (supposed to be) out so soon. It's currently planned for a summer release as well.
Don't run away from these fresh scans
We've seen plenty of scans and screens for the upcoming Away: Shuffle Dungeon. Being developed by Mistwalker, Hironobu Sakaguchi's new development studio and Artoon's Naoto Oshima, it's a unique title in that the environments will be ever-shifting and ever-changing, allowing for quite the replay value, we assume. These latest scans come courtesy of Famitsu, so be sure to head past the break and give them a look over.
Away: Merchandising Opportunity
Away: Shuffle Dungeon isn't all about unreliable dungeon layouts and goggle-eyed protagonists, it would appear. The latest screens reveal magical creatures called Fuppons, little blobby things that follow you around and perform magical attacks. There are four different kinds of Fuppons, each possessing a different ability: Koorins, who produce ice and allow you to destroy barriers made of lava rock; Merameras, who shoot fireballs; Gorogoros, who generate lightning bolts; and the pictured Naooru, who can heal your party.More importantly, all four are suitable to be made into plush toys, cell phone charms, and figurines. Away is a Hironobu Sakaguchi-produced game, after all. There are screens of the other three Fuppons doing what they do best (as far as we know) at Famitsu!
Away shuffles the rendering styles
We hate to disappoint you, but if you were desperately holding on to some insane hope that the blocky, sub-Final Fantasy VII look of Away's characters was somehow an artifact of a poor scan, these new direct-feed screens will disabuse you of that notion. The flat faces and blank, circular eyes continue to look really damn creepy, in character art and in gameplay. Luckily, the game is Away: Shuffle Dungeon, and not Away: Hanging Out With 1996-Era Character Art. Meaning that the majority of your game time should be spent focusing on dungeon crawling, and not face-to-face chatting with the polygon-economical cast. In fact, the actual dungeon part is 2D, character art and all. And it looks really nice. For some reason, Mistwalker and AQ Interactive have decided that the only time the characters should look embarrassingly ridiculous is when you're talking to them. Why didn't they just stick with 2D for the whole game?
Let these scans take you Away
Move over, Exit -- there's a new rescue game in town. Away, the latest from Mistwalker, and a joint effort from Hironobu Sakaguchi and Artoon's Naoto Oshima, is set to challenge players with rescuing villagers from peril in a shifting environment. Traveling on the bottom screen? Look out, the top screen may change -- and vice versa -- and players find themselves stuck waiting until the shifting has stopped before they can move on. It certainly sounds like an interesting concept, especially when rescued villagers return home to build up their town. It sounds like the more you save, the bigger the game can get.While Away: Shuffle Dungeon certainly sounds like it could be a blast, we can't help but raise an eyebrow at the look. Oh, the environments and monster designs are fine, and maybe even great, but the characters ... they look somewhat reminiscent of MySims characters, if the MySims characters in question were very stoned and possibly annoyed. Or blank-faced and cheerful. That girl just gives us the willies. If she's in danger, we might just leave her behind. Hit the jump to see the full scans for yourself.
Mistwalker reminds us they have something besides Blue Dragon
When it was revealed that Blue Dragon would make its way onto the DS, albeit in a different shape and form than it appears on the Xbox 360, there was also another title that developer Mistwalker was to bring to the DS. Titled Away: The Kidnapped People, little was known regarding it, other than Hironobu Sakaguchi and Nobuo Uematsu were working on it directly. Now, courtesy of a Japanese press release (link goes to pdf file), new details regarding the game have surfaced. It appears that Away: The Kidnapped People is to utilize a unique randomized dungeon system. Described as an action RPG, the fine folks over at Siliconera deduced that since the Japanese press release calls the game Away: Shuffle Dungeon, and with the Blue Dragon random dungeon generator DLC for Xbox 360 being titled "Shuffle Dungeon Maker," that Away must use the same randomized dungeon feature.[Via Joystiq]
Is Mistwalker's next DS game a random dungeon crawler?
Are the Blue Dragon developers working on a "roguelike" action RPG for the Nintendo DS? And more importantly, what the hell is a roguelike?Siliconera has deciphered the Japanese press release for Mistwalker's DS title Away, which has been renamed Away: Shuffle Dungeon. Using the Socratic method common sense, Siliconera has deduced that since the Blue Dragon random dungeon generator DLC for Xbox 360 has been titled "Shuffle Dungeon Maker," Away must be using the same term to describe its primary gameplay mechanic: randomly-generated dungeons that the player has to traverse.Roguelike is a special term reserved for dungeon-crawling action games that utilize randomly-generated level design. The term comes from the game Rogue, and the genre includes titles like Nethack and Tales of Middle Earth. Away could potentially be the first game in this genre to appear on the DS (although homebrew efforts have previously been made). Roguelike or not, Away: Shuffle Dungeon is is due out in Japan on February 28 (which just happens to be someone's birthday...).
Gamers won't wait long for Blue Dragon DS
Blue Dragon DS, the spin-off (or possible continuation) of the Xbox 360 RPG, was just announced and now Mistwalker promises it will be on shelves by next March. Those guys work fast! But just to sweeten the pot, they've also promised another title to release even sooner -- AWAY Tsuresarareta Hitobito, aka Away: The Kidnapped People -- which is slated for January 31 in Japan. There are some big names working on Away, most notably Mistwalker's Hironobu Sakaguchi and renowned composer Nobuo Uematsu. Both titles look to have some serious potential, and if ASH is any indication, we can start expected a flood of scans right about ... now, and video precisely three days before the games are released.It's okay, Mistwalker. We like you anyway.
