By John Walker on January 8th, 2009 at 11:40 pm.
Capcom are so predictable! If it’s not a game about a young lawyer solving murder mysteries with the power of his glowing necklace and dead boss possessing the body of a 15 year old girl, it’s a game about herding sheep with a UFO. Just typical. The latter is Flock, a completely barking mad-looking puzzle game that… well, I couldn’t have summed it up better: it’s herding sheep with a UFO.
Announced last summer at E3 for PC and the console download services, there’s finally a new trailer released for CES 09. Things are still oddly quiet on Capcom’s own site, either US or Europe. It goes unmentioned. But if you dig deep enough you’ll find it on Capcom Digital, which looks as though it was made in 1997. Anyway, more details there.
Have a look at the trailer. It looks gorgeous:
The aim is to gather various animals in your mothership, the game apparently using “a sophisticated physics engine that drives the challenging puzzle elements of the game.” That seems like it might be a slight exaggeration, but still, I think it looks rather lovely. It’s going to allow co-op play, which is basically the future of puzzle games now, right? And will come bundled with a level editor.
It’s being made by Dundee company, Proper Games. (Their website shows off the recent batch of screenshots.) Among their ranks are some industry vets, and they state their intent is to create downloadable games that bring us “the old school arcade values we all grew up loving.” Splendid stuff.
A demo was released last December on the PlayStation Network, which is naff all use for us, but at least we know that it’s with us soon. Oh, and it has its own Facebook page. And that’s all the Flock news I have.
I’m just loving Capcom more and more.
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SHEEP.
Did anyone else play that game way back when? It was amazing, I loved it, it actually defined gaming for me for a long time.
Y’know? Pick a herder and herd sheep through the most insane, tripped-out levels ever? Henchmen cows? An evil pear? Start with the farm and go to the nightclub, via the space station and chocolate factory?
*cough*
That was for the PS1, so says Wikipedia. This looks a bit like a remake/resurrection. And therefore I WANT IT.
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Ooh, this game tickles my fancy, i must say.
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It seems to feature you herding “Dougal from the magic Round about”s. So that’s nice.
But I was burnt by the infuriating demo to Sheep so I’ll remain cautious.
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Now that’s different. And awesome.
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I remember Sheep, Wildbluesun. It was…. strange.
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Ufo with sheep ?
Where I saw that before ?
Oh yes, TANKTICS.
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“‘a sophisticated physics engine that drives the challenging puzzle elements of the game.’ That seems like it might be a slight exaggeration, but still, I think it looks rather lovely.”
Oh come on, it looks sophisticated enough to allow the gameplay to work right, which is al that matters.
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It also looks similar to Crop Circles, an arcade game released on the PC and Mac back in 1998 (over ten years ago, now… thanks for making me feel old, game).
http://www.mobygames.com/game/crop-circles-escape-from-planet-3
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This is pressing all my pleasure buttons.
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Sheep was awesome! Granted, it was insanely difficult, so I don’t think I ever got more than halfway through it, but it was really fun. Dripping with personality.
This looks like a worthwhile update, so I’ll have to keep an eye on it.
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Hahaha that slight pause as the ufo realises it has driven the sheep off the cliff.
When is it out?
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Doctor Sampa:
That was my very first thought on seeing the screenshot – it’s Tanktics + Sheep! It’s as though late-90′s PC game development never stopped <3
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Yep, this look pretty lovely.
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I hope they release it as a digital download. It looks fun.
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Wildbluesun: I know it, too. It was very tough, but the music was genius. My sister has become interested in retro type games (I bought her a PS1 for her birthday) so I think I might try to get a hold of that. Hell there will likely be loads on Amazon.
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Yep, I played Sheep on PC when it came out … brilliant game! Flock looks like it’ll succeed Sheep quite nicely.
Also, “Proper Games” is an awesome name … why has no Brit developer used this before? :)
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That was a lovely synopsis of Phoenix Wright in the second sentence. I’ll have to keep that one in mind, for convincing friends and strangers to play.
Ben
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Instant purchase. I’ll probably get it on Live Arcade though because of the co-op.
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@Doctor Sampa: Man, I thought I’d be the only person to remember Tanktics.
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Being a silly Qore subscriber, I got the Flock demo last month on my pee-ess-three, quite a bit of fun to be had, lots of love in the small details.
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That trailer gave me the first grin of the day. Well done!
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I remember finding Sheep annoyingly challenging too…
Until I found the difficulty settings.
You could get it to only 5 sheep to complete the level, meaning you could do a few just by carrying the sheep past everything. O’ course, if you were a true addict you then went back and did it again, so as to beat all your cousins’ high scores.
Ahhhhh good times. Four pre-pubescent relatives happily having half-hour turns on Sheep.
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Hey, I remember Sheep too! I also remember liking it; granted, my opinions from back then are not considered very high quality material by my current self. Anyway, I don’t remember the game being hard but I was probably one of the lucky folks who discovered the difficulty settings.
As far as Flock goes, I can’t say I’m really impressed. It reminds me of Look out Mr Johnson!, only it’s top-down and with swarms. Still, I’d love it if RPS gave us updates on this one, since it may result in me changing my mind.
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Sheep! Class act.
Also, anyone recall “Sheep, Dog ‘n’ Wolf”?
FLOCK IS JUST A SDW CLONE LOLOL
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This looks ace.
also: SDW was really good fun too. Conclusion? Sheep in games makes games better games. games.
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I owned Sheep! It was like lemmings. I thought it was pretty pants. ¬_¬
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another Capcom game “age of booty” is due to come out on impulse sharpish as the stated release date is the 31 of December 2008. Now to find out if its a pirate game or a hip hop video game. $9.99 (aka £6.56)is a pretty tidy price too.
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Mmmm. Sheep, Dog ‘n’ Wolf pretty much sank without a trace but I remember it being of decent stock, despite the godawful name. It was set in the Warner Brothers cartoon “universe” which meant rubbing cel-shaded shoulders with Daffy Duck, Bugs Bunny and the like.
EDIT: Whoa Nelly! It appears I was remembering SDW completely wrong. Man, do I ever feel stupid. Plus, the edit system broke my post. Crivens!
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Looks like something I’d have played off an Amiga Power coverdisk catapulted into the future. This is a good thing.
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I’d get it just for seeing and hearing those sheep bounce around. Also, penis crop circles.
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All I can say is you missed a trick not using ‘Like lambs to the saucer‘ as the post title…
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Oh to hell with it. Comment editing killed my family!
EDIT: Oh, NOW you want to work? You’re just being spiteful, edit button. SPITEFUL.
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I think I saw about this a while back, either in PC Gamer or on one of the inferior gaming sites I visit.
Either way, it looks finger-giggling-good.
….
Or something.
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That looks amazing.
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The Sheep dying made me sad. Then their Angel ghosts floated up and I laughed. SOLD!
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*GLEE*
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That looks a laugh :)
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I aprove this game.
Everyone involved get bonus points for this.
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manintheshack: That’s brilliant. Sorry, RPS, but you have been out-punned.
(I remember Tanktics too! Good times).
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A chance to go “BAAH!” without feeling like you’re part of some herd mentality gone wrong? Yes, please.
My trust in Capcom seems to have been a good bet :)
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I also thought of Tanktics when I saw the screenshots, which I have never played, yet it left quite an impact on me, because Tanktics was the very first video game review in a magazine that I ever read.
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That looks joyous.
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@heliocentric
And thank you for making me google “Age of Booty”.
But I admit it was all me who then clicked on image search.
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Am I the only one concerned by all the, uh, “love” expressed here for any games involving sheep? I thought this here was an English-ish website, not a Scottish one. ;)
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@Scandalon: I think you’re confusing stereotypes, but in any case, who doesn’t love sheep?!
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Sheep are awesome and have made every game that has them better. Getting all 10 sheep for the farmer in Black and White was so worth it!
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Also I got a “Sheep Placenta On Sale” ad by google shown on this page. What.
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AWESOME
Hope it’s on Steam. Steam is a safe haven for weird, creative, original games like this one. They get eaten up. Unless they’re godawful.
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Looks like fun. Which is better than some.
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Nice to see I am not the only one who remembers Tanktics!
And yeah Flock looks like fun.
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Why can I not find a demo of a game called Flock on PSN, only the rather lackluster but amusing at the time PS1 game Sheep? Or am I being blind?
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To answer my own comment, the Flock demo on PSN is a Qore exclusive which is some paid for PSN magazine in the US not available to us brits. Wikipedia, as ever, has an article on Qore. Think I’ll stick with XBox Live paid for as at least with that you know what you’re getting.
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LOL, immediately thought of Tanktics. Fun game…wish they’d release a level editor for it.
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