Gungrave G.O.R.E. could have been a Soulslike, says developer - GamesHub

Gungrave began beingness arsenic a gothic ‘Wild West’ shooter for PlayStation 2 successful 2002, amidst a revival of supernatural occidental tales successful fiction. The game’s protagonist, Beyond the Grave, was a stylish gunslinger designed by Yasuhiro Nightow, known for his enactment connected the Trigun anime series. In substance and design, it paid homage to this classical franchise, attracting a wide subordinate basal astir arsenic a result. Gungrave’s popularity was capable to spawn a sequel – Gungrave: Overdose – and an anime bid of its own.

While it went dormant aft this little success, workplace Iggymob remained fans of the bid – and successful 2017, relaunched it arsenic a VR action-shooter. According to Kim Kay, COO of Iggymob, via translator and Gungrave G.O.R.E. project manager Bobby J. Park, this was an important turning constituent successful the modern Gungrave revival.

‘When we archetypal made [Gungrave VR], it was much of a investigating phase,’ Kay told GamesHub during a caller PLAION steadfast showcase event. ‘At the time, determination were rather a batch of VR shooting games. The full happening started from maine thinking, “oh, wherefore don’t we marque a VR mentation retired of [Gungrave]? How would it consciousness to marque Grave arsenic VR?’

‘The astir feedback we received arsenic we were making the VR mentation was that radical were asking for a non-VR version. There’s lone truthful overmuch we tin archer the users astir the communicative … and we couldn’t truly amusement everything they wanted. We wanted to amusement a much in-depth mentation of the Gungrave series, and its unsocial fun.’

This feedback process led to the instauration of a fully-fledged, third-person shooter designed to instrumentality nonstop inspiration from the archetypal Gungrave games connected PlayStation 2. Gungrave G.O.R.E., acceptable to merchandise connected 22 November 2022, is described arsenic a caller section for the franchise. At a caller preview, we were capable to get a little hands-on with the upcoming title, and recovered it to beryllium a high-power, gothic, bloody powerfulness fantasy.

_{Image: Studio Iggymob}

According to Kay, the crippled is designed to beryllium affable to newcomers – though a moving cognition of the archetypal Gungrave series is recommended. It’s a nonstop sequel to 2nd title, Overdose, and continues the events laid retired successful the games from the aboriginal 2000s.

‘I judge it volition beryllium much entertaining if you play the erstwhile versions,’ Kay said. ‘But adjacent for those newcomers who’ve ne'er played Gungrave, we added a small video connected the paper which explains a small spot astir past – truthful they won’t person immoderate occupation playing the crippled and understanding.’

That said, Gungrave is not beholden to the mechanics of the past – and alternatively pays homage, portion modernising the travel of combat, and the gameplay systems.

‘Most shooting games person a reload system,’ Kay said. ‘Traditionally, successful the Gungrave series, you don’t person to reload. So you don’t person to fell yourself and reload oregon dodge – we don’t request each of that. You conscionable person to support moving forward, and termination immoderate you see.’

In progressive gameplay, this means Grave operates arsenic a solid, heavier fig that tin instrumentality a batch of harm – an obstacle for enemies to overcome. Without entree to high-speed attacks, oregon needing overmuch finesse to survive, players tin simply unleash their weaponry connected advancing force hordes, rolling and firing with each property of the button. In this way, you tin wide hallways successful an instant.

Read: Gungrave G.O.R.E. preview – A gothic and bloody powerfulness fantasy

Grave is powered by a unit known arsenic ‘necro DNA’ – which besides revived him to a semi-undead authorities successful the game’s canon – allowing him to forge up with small respect for his ain safety. All helium cares astir is protecting Mika, the girl of Grave’s erstwhile love.

‘The 1 happening helium remembers is that helium needs to support a miss named Mika,’ Kay explained of Grave’s ngo successful G.O.R.E. ‘That’s the only thing helium remembers.’

With this missive arsenic your guiding star, players acceptable disconnected connected a bloody quest to support Mika and prevention the satellite from the evil forces of Millennion, a corrupt organisation filled with goons and ruthless villains.

_{Image: Iggymob}

This lore was already laid retired for the Iggymob team, built by developers astatine Red Entertainment, and different contributors to the franchise’s 20+ year-old lore. But according to Kay, the hardest situation successful processing a large sequel to this bid wasn’t in adapting the communicative – it was successful marking a people successful a tough, trends-based games industry.

‘When [Iggymob] started processing the game, Souls-like and unfastened satellite [games] were trending – those were taking the large popularity successful the gaming world. So astatine first, we tried to marque the crippled a Souls-like – oregon an unfastened world. When we archetypal came up with the prototype, determination was nary amusive successful it.’

‘As you play the game, [you’ll notice] we person a unsocial gameplay benignant for Gungrave. It would’ve been precise pugnacious if we were to marque it with open-world oregon Soulslike gameplay. The hard happening was we spent a batch of clip reverting to the aged schoolhouse style.’

Iggymob felt powerfully astir these changes, arsenic they judge diverseness successful enactment games is essential. If each crippled is simply a Soulslike game, the marketplace becomes flooded – and it’s overmuch tougher to basal out. But successful grounding Grave and his abilities successful a classic, arcade-like gameplay benignant inspired by PlayStation 2-era classics, Gungrave G.O.R.E. forges its ain identity.

‘We would’ve mislaid the amusive that we person if we followed the way of the train,’ Kay said.

In pursuing a caller track, and spending much clip processing the individuality of Gungrave G.O.R.E, accumulation shifted absorption from constricted ‘last gen’ PlayStation 4 and Xbox One consoles to the modern PlayStation 5 and Xbox Series X/S. According to Kay, this process was a revelation – and allowed the squad to marque G.O.R.E. an wide much immersive experience.

The prime of the visuals was greatly improved by this modulation – arsenic seen successful our demo preview – arsenic were controls and gameplay. On PlayStation 5, the upgrade besides allowed for the inclusion of haptic feedback and adaptive trigger pushback connected the DualSense controller.

‘It volition beryllium a much dynamic acquisition due to the fact that you tin consciousness it done the controllers,’ Kay said.

_{Image: Iggymob}

While the squad conquered a scope of challenges successful creating the game, including processing done the coronavirus pandemic and contending with a frozen concern manufacture – which meant determination were times the squad weren’t paid for their enactment – they were yet capable to support stableness and advancement with the enactment of publishing partners.

‘Our squad inactive had the anticipation and the passionateness to make the game, truthful went on,’ Kay said of the agelong improvement process and changeless iteration.

‘The full improvement play got extended a small spot – but luckily and thankfully, we recovered partners who believed our passion, who believed successful us. So we were fortunate to enactment with much radical to marque the game.’

After a agelong play of anticipation, Gungrave G.O.R.E is yet acceptable to motorboat for PlayStation 4, PlayStation 5, Xbox One, Xbox Series X/S and Windows PC connected 22 November 2022.