Yacht Club Games’ Shovel Knight, currently seeking funding with Kickstarter, will add Nintendo’s 3DS and Wii U to its list of platforms if it reaches its $75,000 goal in just under a month from now. A copy of the game, developed by a group of former WayForward (Batman: The Brave and The Bold) employees, will cost you a $10 pledge for the PC version and $15 for the Nintendo copies owing to extra costs for console development, certification and that sort of thing.
Yacht Club are exhibiting the title at PAX East this week with a view to having a playable demonstration. The game is apparently built around the mechanic of a downward thrust of the shovel, used to attack enemies from above (as well as from the side, which fits less snugly into the ‘downward thrust’ category). If that sounds totally crazy, it’s only because your brain’s in perfect working order. Here, have a look at the trailer:
See, it looks 8-bit and it sounds 8-bit, but with the benefit of modern physics (though I guess that’s subjective). As with the majority of downloadable throwback titles, it also looks plenty difficult. Don’t these developers’ senses of nostalgia allow for recreation of less-sadistic gaming experiences from the NES’s heyday? It wasn’t all Ghosts’n Goblins and Battletoads. Come to think of it, I’m surprised the G’n G franchise (encompassing Ghouls’n Ghosts) hasn’t been the subject of a lovingly-coded digital makeover. I’m sure it’d go down well with people who HATE THEIR THUMBS.
Anyway, I’m nowhere near excited enough about Shovel Knight to help fund its creation, but then again, I’m not that generous anyway. Given how much Yacht Club claims to have accomplished with its coding to date (from aesthetics to the core game design) I’m not sure their target amount is realistic either, but this week’s appearance at PAX East is sure to play a large part in how this all ends up.