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Heavenly Sword 2 artwork appears
Heavenly Sword 2 will likely never see the light of day, but concept art that's reportedly from the deceased project is making the internet rounds today. Although the origin of the art is muddy, Siliconera reports the concept art shows the Ravens and the Raven King, who were the samurai-inspired antagonists, along with other characters and sets for the sequel.Sony canceled the Sony Cambridge-helmed sequel back in 2008. The original game was developed by Ninja Theory, which is currently working on the new Devil May Cry.
Sony Cambridge concept artist shows work from failed pitches
Artist Jason Wilson was a concept artist at Sony's Cambridge studio (before it was folded into Guerilla Games earlier this year). Over on his personal portfolio blog, he's shared a few concept pieces for various pitches put together by the studio on projects that never got made. Simian is the first title he describes: It was an early iteration of what would become Sony's EyePet, with a more alien and mature "adventure game set on a strange alien jungle planet."Wilson also talks about a first-person shooter named Revolution 4 that portrayed a War of the Worlds-style alien invasion in the middle of modern London (but which later was canceled in favor of Resistance: Fall of Man), as well as a first-person survival horror game named Manhattan, featuring frenzied zombies as opponents, and some strategy elements in terms of clearing checkpoints and saving survivors.Finally, Wilson posts art from a third-person assassin action game called Zodiac Assassin, which featured a world-traveling female protagonist and some exotic settings. Again, Heavenly Sword was also in progress at Sony at the time, and the company decided in favor of that game rather than the one Wilson was pitching at Cambridge. It's quite a menu Wilson lays out here, and for dishes we'll never get to eat.
NGP Killzone in development at Sony Cambridge
The next Killzone game is the first not to be developed by series creators, Guerrilla Games. Instead, Gamerzines has learned that they have passed on development to Sony's Cambridge studio. While fans of the excellent Killzone Liberation for PSP may be disappointed to hear that Guerrilla isn't working directly on the game, senior producer Steven Ter Heide told the site that "we'll still oversee it because the universe is something we've built up, we know the war and the rules that have been established, but they're driving the development." The Cambridge studio has worked on the MediEvil franchise and, most recently, LittleBigPlanet for PSP and TV Superstars for PlayStation Move.
LittleBigPlanet PSP loses multiplayer, and maybe its soul
Like a child with all the world's toys at his disposal but no one to play with, Sackboy drifts lonesomely across the 2D plane. At first glance, the confines of LittleBigPlanet PSP appear to be punishment for the heaps of joy he carelessly reaped with his now missing friends -- even with complete strangers -- as they indulged in orgies of pure fun in the PS3 version. Had he taken these spontaneous acts of foolishness and delight for granted, Sackboy wondered."The one thing we've lost is multiplayer," senior producer Mark Green explained of LBP PSP to Eurogamer at GamesCom this week. "The system is physically capable of doing multiplayer, but perhaps not with the full physics system. On the technical side of things you lose a third of the processing power or a third of the system memory just to do multiplayer at all. With those limitations we couldn't achieve it." Couldn't achieve what? Joy?Green did clarify that the PSP game will feature "full" level creation and sharing (online/ad-hoc) modes. Additionally, further tweaks to LBP PSP include downsizing the game field to one 2D plane (no foreground and background planes) and so-called improvement upon the original's floaty jump mechanic. Did we also mention there's ... no multiplayer?
LittleBigPlanet PSP creation mode looks just like PS3 version
Playing only makes up for one third of the "Play, Create, Share" motto. We know LittleBigPlanet for PSP plays a lot like the PS3 version. But, how's the creation aspect? Sony Cambridge shared a new trailer at Gamescom today highlighting the creation tools of LBP PSP.For better or for worse, it looks exactly like it did on the PS3. The Pop-It tool seems to drive the familiar experience, giving players access to a variety of textures and objects. The PS3 editor certainly has been successful so far (creating over a million levels so far), but those that expected a more streamlined process for the handheld version may be disappointed.
