In 1986 SNK released Ikari Warriors, it had all the makings of a classic title. Cool weapons, time strategies, two player action and a great challenge. We’re now seeing folks reproduce some of the essence of classic games by creating platformers like Little Big Planet and Mega Man 9, where is the love for the top-down scrollers?
Ikari Wariors was one of the first game titles to use a rotary joystick along with a directional system. Looking at the current generation Xbox 360 and PlayStation 3 it’s plain to see the joystick is equipped with this design. We’ve seen Geometry Wars utilize the analog stick to create a 360 directional attack, so it’s possible to utilize this behavior for Ikari Warriors.
Given SNK is still alive under the name SNK Playmore the intellectual property must still exist to breath fresh life into an Ikari Warrior remake, with about six to eight months development time a classy title could be re-developed using old concepts brought to the current generation hardware.
Blast grenades, RPG’s, smart bombs, air strikes the options are limitless and the concept has been proven to work. Given the gamer demographic of 18-34 it’s plain to see old gamers of the Arcade and NES would recall and rebuild their love for the title while attracting younger audiences whom have never seen an Ikari Warriors title; if it worked in 1986 are we so adverse to it working again?
Games do not have to implement full 3D perspective graphics to be cool, we’ve seen proof in that with the Wii and the demand for titles like Little Big Planet. We neeed another Ikari Warriors.
@gaming flashback
I don’t tend to associate UK with good game development (due to the life choking taxes), but Bolo sounds like a clever and complex action-strategy game. Almost makes me wish I was born 20 years earlier to play it (almost, being old sucks). To be honest, I feel like there are no good online games anymore and most that are released are just regurgitations of earlier success. I am hoping next gen will bring a breath of fresh air to the competitive online world.
@Rats leaving the sinking ship
I played a few demos of PGA tour but never liked them. The concept of hitting a ball with a club across the same field of green is probably the most pathetic attempt at recreation mankind has ever devised. It should be renaimed PGAL (Please Get A Life).
@First official COD free for all tournament
Whenever I hear news like this it makes me think that everyone in the Activision management offices evacuated the building and left a duck in charge. Where they beta testing Black Friday or something?
@QOTW
What’s your favourite soundtrack? With the atrocious state that the contemporary music industry is in, I tend to turn more and more towards the anime and gaming tunes. My favourite is the opening march of Morrowind and my favourite song has to be Still Alive (both from Mirror’s Edge and Portal). Other notable tracks are Utada Hikaru’s Kingdom Hearts ending (both Japanese and English), Guitaroo Man soundtracks, FFX and too many others to mention. Gaming has some good tunes. What’s yours?