Blue's News reports that a new website has gone live at Shadowwarrior.com, a domain developer 3D Realms has owned since before the studio launched its Build-based Shadow Warrior first-person shooter back in 1997. The new site is merely one huge screenshot showing a dead yakuza, and mirrors a subdomain located at Devolver Digital.
The tease coincides with the launch of Devolver Digital's Blade Analyzer Pro sword collection software on Steam Greenlight. The software supposedly uses the PC’s camera to scan any sword or knife into the user's collection and cross-reference it with a robust database of blades to analyze and identify any item in the user's collection. This collection can be organized by sword type, period of use, and rarity.
The software was supposedly developed by Zilla Enterprises founder and sword collector "Master" Orochi Zilla for his personal use. Zilla Enterprises, described as a global conglomerate, is the fictional evil corporation from the original Shadow Warrior.
You no mess with Lo Wang!
Based on the single screenshot, games publisher Devolver Digital and Hard Reset developer Flying Wild Hog are casting aside the ancient Build engine and bringing the franchise into the 2010s. As previously stated, there are no details, so it's unknown what engine will power the new game. Will it follow the same storyline, or will this be a complete reboot? Will we see the same mix of katanas, shurikens, rocket launchers and grenade launchers? We hope so.
It will be interesting to see if Shadow Warrior retains the same campy wit of the original. 3D Realms received a huge dose of criticism for allegedly being racially insensitive and promoting stereotypes. However the studio defended its game, saying that it purposely parodied bad Kung Fu movies to generate chatter.
"We intentionally mixed the nationalities [of protagonist Lo Wang], not out of ignorance, but because we knew it would generate mass amounts of flames [derogatory e-mail] and e-mail debates online," 3D Realms president George Broussard said (pdf). "We just wanted to give people something to talk about. In the end Lo Wang is who you want him to be, and since 'you' sort of become him in the game, we think it’s good to have a fuzzy background, so you can assume his role more easily."
Who wants to bet Shadow Warrior makes an appearance next month during E3 2013? Even more, who wants some Wang?
