The rumours were true. Beyond Good & Evil 2 is go. Repeat: Beyond Good & Evil 2 is go. Woowoowoo!
An extremely confident, pig-laden teaser trailer waits for you beneath the cut, like a lost lover suddenly returned.
Happy days, non?
Absolutely no information yet though – it’s not even been officially referred to as BG&E2 so far, simply Michel Ancel’s next project. Who cares what it ends up being called, though? Just look at it. There are vague reports this footage is in-engine, which I’m not sure whether to believe – but if so, blimey. This might just be the best gaming news of the year. Not simply because BG&E was a lovely game, but because the odds of Giant Megacorp Greenlighting Sequel To Commercially Unsuccessful Cult Classic seemed so very, very remote despite the persistent rumours of Jade’s return. Turns out the world’s not such a terrible place after all.
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OH MY GOD MY EYES ARE LITERALLY WATERING WITH JOY!!!!! I JUST RAN ROUND THE ROOM SHOUTING GETTING ODD LOOKS FROM MY GF BUT I DONT CARE! EEEEEEK [/caps]
If it manages to capture the atmosphere of the first game there’ll be no shame in wetting myself from joy while playing it.
Hmm, seems to have taken a slightly more realistic bent in terms of the visuals. Was kind of hoping for an update more along the lines of what Rare have pulled off with the new Banjo.
I think that’s enough negativity for one post though, as regardless of my quibbles this news has still left me grinning from ear to ear.
Sweeeet!
Now we just need an Anachronox sequel.
Reply to Man Raised By Puffins
Your talking about realism in a video consisting of a pig inhaling live flies. A pig whose the adoptive father/uncle of a Buddhist wildlife reporter. A Buddhist who saved him from a space fascist’s moon prison.
Looking at the piccies, the Pey’J model at least is a proper in-game asset. Environment and rendering harder to tell.
I want a high-res Jade now please Mr Ancel…
I hope they stick with the same atmosphere and sense of place. That was one of the many reasons i loved it. Some of the gameplay mechanics werent perfect but im sure we’d all die a little inside if they changed it to a shooter to sell more copies. Sure hope we see it for PC. Ubi are usually generous with multi-platform releases so it seems likely
@Jonathan -
I’m fairly certain Mr. Puffins was commenting purely on the art direction, and he’s got a point there. The original art direction was rather Disney-esque, which, for whatever reason, makes those characters and activities feel a heck of a lot less weird(for lack of a better word). Moving it to a more realistic art direction decreases how well it meshes because it loses some/alot of that cartoony nature. Still, I squee the hell out of this announcement.
@ Phil H: Yeah, that’s pretty much what I was getting at.
Reply to Phil H
I still don’t think it’s that realistic though it’s hard to tell with fantastical characters. Give me a good shot of Jade and then we’ll talk about the realism. It certainly has a way to go before it reaches Pixar/Dreamworks levels. But I see no reason to be negative at this point certainly not about an aesthetic choice.
“Oh Yade, I stock dis for yuu”
Brilliant.
So, I tried playing BG&E 2 or three times, I’ve owned both the xbox and GC version (used, I must confess) and whilst the intro and beginning were quite lovely, (including much of the world/characters, as others have said) I found it to kind of die out…I think I got stuck at the first “Boss” fight, the one w/ the giant green cyclops-toad thing? I remember getting frustrated w/ that part at least…am I just lame at console controls?
Did the story ever actually *get* beyond Good and Evil? Did it ever get past “People in authority are controlling and bad, fight the man!”? Heck, the name of the game is a reference to (I believe) Bhuddishm, is it not? Does it ever dive into any of that? (I actually think the majority of which is rubbish, that you can’t actually *get* beyond G&E without commiting horrible, evil acts, but I’d sure love to explore a game that, well, explores it…)
Scandalon,
It’s actually the name of a book by Nietzsche. And, for all its apparent pretension, I didn’t find it delivered, either. Granted, I haven’t played much more than you have yet, but while I was impressed by the characters and sense of a coherent world, the actual plot and ganeplay seemed kind of flat. It still seems like a great experience, for the art direction if nothing else, but I still don’t quite see why it’s deserving of such unanimous and unequivocal praise.
And I actually hope those aren’t actual game assets, because I’d prefer it keep the cartoony art. When you have a world populated by anthropomorphic animals, realism is a bad choice.
Was under impression the title is referring to book by German philosopher, Friedrich Nietzsche. The ‘bad government’ you get to fight in the game could be probably seen as merely following Nietzsche’s teaching, leaving behind the traditional morality.
*splaf*
@Jonathan – Certainly too early to tell how near or far from realism it is at this point, hence the some/alot in my last comment, but the first game was entirely cartoon in appearance whereas the environment here seems to lean well into realistic territory.
I like the new art style. Pig is grotesque but not too much so. Disturbing but still interesting and on the whole enticing me to see more of it. I’m sure there’ll be lotsa cute characters to see for those who prefer that… I don’t think it’s just making it “realistic” as some people say. It’s obvious a lot of care has gone into the pig character with his facial expressions and such (watch his eyes when he’s pulling in the wasp). It just looks fantastic. The original sure looked great but so does this (so far) imho.
That’s not a wasp, it’s a fly.
Not surprising that 51 flies have visited him so far since they are attracted to stench, and, well… Pey’j… he’s probably stinky.
Also, Squee.
What surprises me about the art style is that it looks like Ubisoft are actually putting money into this game.
I can just about believe a sequel has been green lit, but to actually have real money spent on it! I can’t help but feel that Ancel will be kept under Alpha Section lockdown with a big Ubisoft corp guy looming overhead saying ‘you better make this one sell(able)’.
Dear Lord I’m a knob sometimes…yes, Nietzche, though I swear there was a more formal belief system that had a similar phrase,not sure what I was thinking…I blame it on fighting w/ Windows Server 2008, virtualization, and a NAS all day.
I did, however, find an interview in which a PR guys states:
[Tyrone Miller]: Many people assume that Beyond Good & Evil is a reference to the Friedrich Nietzsche book by the same name. Although you could probably make an argument – this game really has no connection to the German philosopher. As an action reporter, players need to investigate beyond the superficial facts of what is good and what is evil – which is dictated through government propaganda in the game. The player has to see what nobody else can see, what is hidden to the people of Hyllis. This theme is relevant to issues we face today – understanding the reasons behind the apparent facts.
…which, yea, seems a bit of a let-down. So, is it worth it to re-obtain BG&E and complete it? I still have to finish Okami and PoP:TTT. (And Stalker and…)
RE: Art style – I didn’t think the “better/more realistic” graphics hurt it at all, at least, not in the trailer. How it matches up with the “gameplay” however… In refutation of Johnathan’s statement about the believability of the plot. It’s not that realism per-se is bad but is it believable?!? Contrast this with the latest Zelda, in which you now have a fairly realistic looking character and world, but the behaviour doesn’t make sense, doesn’t “look” right. i.e Link holding up a gem as big as his head everytime he opens a chest – but he’s not even holding it, it’s floating in some anachronistic way that’s basically a holdover from the original NES. (Same with the respawning enemies and a host of other design decisions of varying degrees of WTFery.)
Any game with an awesome flying classic Pontiac is good enough to try. Even a broken down one.
I played BG&E for the first time about a week or so ago. It was good, I just had a few beefs with it:
1) Short game is short. I guess it’s to keep it from getting repetitive or whatever, but I felt very sad inside when it was over.
2) The game just hands you pearls when you need them. There’s no real point in having to buy parts when you always have the resources to do so.
3) I loved taking pictures of animals ‘n stuff, but it felt like that aspect of the game was completely separate from the rest of it, like it was some kind of afterthought.
All in all, a great game that I feel needed to be fleshed out just a little more to be perfect. I highly, highly recommend it to everyone, and it’s only like ten bucks on Steam. Also, it has probably one of the greatest last boss fights ever.
I ’spose this means I have to track down the first one and play it for the first time, doesn’t it? One more for the gaming backlog.
Always happy to see a cult sequel, though. Hope to see more of this sort of thing in the future.
Propaganda!
Great! Now, where to send giant blocks of marzipan shaped after the letters “P” and “C”?
I’ll feel personally insulted if there is no PC version, seeing how I am one of the people who bought the first one at full price on the release day. *grumble*
And even though I have owned a copy of this since the day of release I have still yet to play it. Why? ‘Cos it hates Nvidia cards. Back at the time of release it had HUGE GFX corruption if you were using the latest Nvidia cards (read: that early indoor level where you rescue a slightly mad soldier type is mostly rendered invisible) and it has gotten worse every generation since.
Seeing this conjured up a vague sense of hope so I have just tried to install it again. Under Vista, however, even the damned installer doesn’t work now!
Sigh. May just have to pick it up for PS2…
Don’t like the added realism to the look, but I’ve no worries about the actual game being yum.
Propagandah!
Yeah, I bought BG&E used a few months ago but couldn’t get it to work properly even after a loooong nVidia driver struggle. If I disable gamma correction, everything runs five times faster than normal. If I leave it on, video and audio are not in sync. If I disable V-sync, the video stutters every two seconds. If I install earlier drivers, the game freezes in the main menu.
Most frustrating. Has anyone succeeded in finding a working configuration for a 8800-series nVidia card and if so, how?
These instructions were of no use to me, but for someone else they might, so I’m posting them here.
Another SQUEE for the best gaming news of the year.
I played through the original with my girlfriend – she bought it full-price on the PS2 and we spent a couple of weekends curled up on the sofa taking turns. Not the best game I’ve ever played, but certainly one of the most engaging, and with the best-realised player character.
Oh god yes… I have to leave urgently to tell everyone I can see in the street about this.
Oh happy days!
Psychonauts sequel next, please. :D
@ Johnathon: I think there is some confusion over what I meant by increased realism. The addition of wrinkles, blemishes and so forth to Pey’J grounds him a bit more to the real world (not to mention that it’s abundantly clear that the surrounding area is fairly realistically modelled), which conflicts with his obviously fantastical nature. Personally, I would have prefered a Pixar-style approach which retained the chunky art-style and smooth lines of the first game. But as I made abundantly clear in my first post, this is just a quibble of mine over the apparent art direction.
@ Shanucore: But if we had Psychonauts 2, then we wouldn’t be getting Brütal Legend!
@ Revered Speed: were you away when Syndicate Wars was released, just out of interest?
@Matthew: Syndicate Wars is to Syndicate what Viva Pinata: Party Animals is to Viva Pinata.
There is no Syndicate sequel. =)
Yay :D
I wonder how long we’ll have to wait? At least a year maybe two I reckon.
Will finish BG%E 1 on the old Xbox now. Loved it to bits, just didn’t have time to finish it.
BG&E is five bucks on Steam for the weekend. You guys should mention that, and title the post “Beyond Good & (Nearly) Free-vil”.
I am never going to forgive myself for that.
I can’t see it on Steam.
Let me guess, Ubisoft? Europe gets shafted again, woohoo!
Shit, you’re right. It says North America only.
Awwwwkwaaaaaard.