By Nathan Grayson on March 6th, 2013 at 10:00 am.
In Zeno Clash II, there is punching and uppercutting and kicking and kneeing and winged lion people and juggle combos and bird men and claw guns and cities that look like the industrial age as imagined by a sentient piece of chewing gum and a case of severe underbite that probably wasn’t fixed because dentists rarely work with those wooden things people put paint on and piledrivers and arms coming out the ground and aaaaaaijnfdisnfinidnsekfdkffffffffthrp
That’s probably not even a fourth of the components that make up this trailer’s beautiful bouquet of pure madness, but my words stopped working, so I just spat all over my monitor for a few minutes. And while a fully explorable world’s the obvious big addition here, it looks like Ghat’s picked up quite a few new powers to give his punches some extra oomph. Or whatever the bird-beak-caving-in equivalent of “oomph” is.
I spotted a tether that transfers damage to multiple enemies, some kind of ricocheting gun, and all sorts of snazzy new melee strikes. Enemies seem to have beefed up their inevitable-beatdown-stalling strategies, too, so there’s quite a lot to look forward to here.
Ace Team and Atlus still haven’t nailed down a concrete date, aiming instead for the increasingly narrower window of “early 2013″. But you want to know more now. I can see it in your Rubik’s Cube that’s probably also symbolism for the role of the author in absurdist fiction. And fortunately, Past Jim is here to save the day. He had a fairly lengthy chat with Ace Team last year, and it’s well worth a read. So get to it. Now then, I have some more spitting to dottttttrrhrhweionbmcfffttpppttt.
06/03/2013 at 10:05 GenBanks says:
Excellent! I loved Zeno Clash.
06/03/2013 at 19:23 Ayam says:
“Erminia peed on herself and died anonymously” Classic Zeno Clash moment.
06/03/2013 at 10:10 TomxJ says:
typtiopp[p[[ttpttpttptpppt!!!!
06/03/2013 at 10:16 SF Legend says:
PUNCHFACE
06/03/2013 at 10:17 Gurrah says:
Very good news indeed.
06/03/2013 at 10:18 MOKKA says:
Reminds that I still need to play Zeno Clash 1.
06/03/2013 at 14:10 Kamos says:
You definitely should. It is fun and it convinced me that First Person Fisticuffing is possible.
06/03/2013 at 10:21 RedViv says:
Needs more Father-Mother.
06/03/2013 at 10:26 rapchee says:
i didn’t finish the first one, but it seemed to me that he/she was dead … although was at least one other dead character, and the world is quite weird so it could happen anyways
06/03/2013 at 10:32 Inigo says:
Father-Mother is still alive. The beginning stages of the game involve breaking him/her out of prison. You can actually see it as an objective in the trailer.
06/03/2013 at 10:34 Leaufai says:
I love the art style. Like they thought with every face, item, etc. they went and thought: “we’ll take this ordinary thing like an Asian hat and make it just a little bit more uncomfortable to look at”.
06/03/2013 at 10:36 Arglebargle says:
The first Zeno Clash wasn’t exactly my kind of game, but I bought it anyway, because it was so wonderful.
Looks like this might be the case again…the buying and the wonderful, anyway.
06/03/2013 at 10:37 Prime says:
The art design in this game is exemplary. With each new character or landscape you get the feeling that you’re seeing something genuinely, astonishingly new. When you back up the art with writing like this
then you’ve got something really special, and that’s before you even talk about the excellent fisticuffs!
Can’t wait for this!
(ps: click the quote for the “Corwids of the Free” trailer from the first game)
06/03/2013 at 11:13 slerbal says:
That is a brilliant quote and just took me from “uninterested” to “curious” :)
06/03/2013 at 12:07 Bhazor says:
Not quite as good a quote.
06/03/2013 at 12:16 Soup says:
The art is heavily inspired by Hieronymus Bosch which is something that’s not done nearly enough.
06/03/2013 at 13:41 LennyLeonardo says:
I was only vaguely aware of BOSH, but you have prompted me to look at his paintings and I now realise that he was a mental. Thank you.
07/03/2013 at 04:27 Geen says:
The game is batshit insane, and thus wonderful. It’s like Escher and Bosch had a baby who in turn did a ton of acid and stared at Cthulhu for a few hours, then made a game.
06/03/2013 at 10:37 Windward says:
I love Zeno Clash, buut the gameplay looks just as bad as the first one.
06/03/2013 at 10:43 Muzman says:
That video just said to me “It’s been way too long since you punched a bird-man in the face, hasn’t it”
06/03/2013 at 10:59 Lord Custard Smingleigh says:
Speak for yourself! I just had to stop punching a bird-man in the face just to comment on this. Blast, he got away! Come back, bird-man! I have a punch for yoooouuuuu!
06/03/2013 at 12:12 Bhazor says:
“Ha, you thought Alcatraz was the worst thing that would happen to you”
06/03/2013 at 10:53 Gwilym says:
The arm in the last shot is so incredibly Terry Gilliam. In fact, that entire shot is.
I suppose them being Gilliam fans isn’t a massive surprise after Rock of Ages, but I’m glad the influence extends beyond his goofy cut-out animation and into his crazy gorgeous psychedelapocalyptic vistas. I’ve been waiting for games to do that.
06/03/2013 at 11:25 maninahat says:
Playing Zenoclash, you can spot all sorts of influences. There are weird little details, like the “Dali Crutches” or Gaudi mosaics built into the scenery. It’s a game for art lovers, to be sure.
I can’t fucking wait.
06/03/2013 at 12:59 Ross Angus says:
Looks like they took the gun from eXistenZ – the one from the Chinese restaurant. In the woods.
06/03/2013 at 11:20 GameCat says:
I think Zeno Clash have one of the best fantasy world ever created. It’s so refreshing after that all “king & knights with some magick and dragons” (although you can still make it unique – see Dark Souls) boring settings.
Gameplay is also unusual. No more swinging swords and heavy armours. Let’s punch someone directly into face.
I love this game.
06/03/2013 at 17:16 maninahat says:
Agreed. It is easily my favourite fantasy setting – even more so than Dunwall or Thief’s city. Even the story is out there; you’re on the run for killing a 10 foot tall, hermaphrodite bird! Nothing can be compared to it.
06/03/2013 at 11:21 Droopy The Dog says:
It’s a minor thing but those outragously over the top biff noises make me unreasonably happy.
06/03/2013 at 11:32 GameCat says:
You mean these “PUNCH!” sounds? I can almost see them as a comic onomatopoeia.
06/03/2013 at 11:26 PopeBob says:
Not sure if I should ATATATATA or ORAORAORA.
06/03/2013 at 12:01 suibhne says:
Shine on, you crazy, crazy bastards.
06/03/2013 at 12:04 strangeloup says:
This looks ace (no pun intended), although with the sound effects I kind of wanted to have 60′s Batman-style BIFF! POW! bubbles coming up.
Also, I’ve had the first one for ages and never played it for some reason. I’m going to get on that.
06/03/2013 at 12:15 Jason Moyer says:
More fighting and fewer gimmick levels this time, hopefully.
06/03/2013 at 12:27 Jojolion says:
Every game should be like Zeno Clash. I want games to be interesting and vibrant again, not pathetically aping reality. Like in Zeno Clash I’d look at a tower in the middle of the desert or something and think “Wow, I wonder what’s in there?” whereas in Skyrim I will see absolutely nothing because everything is boring as shit and I’ve fallen asleep.
06/03/2013 at 12:28 The Dark One says:
Are they using Unreal this time? Ghat’s arms have this weird sheen to them throughout the trailer.
06/03/2013 at 12:50 basilisk says:
Yeah, they said Source was unsuitable for the more open world gameplay they wanted to do in this one. And you’re right, his arms definitely have some of that plasticky Unreal engine look.
06/03/2013 at 13:27 aliksy says:
Yeah, the setting and style of the first game were exceptional. Really makes other games with their ho-hum settings look bad in comparison.
06/03/2013 at 13:29 Dowr says:
Please, get some good voice acting this time around.
06/03/2013 at 16:05 cjlr says:
You didn’t like the it’s-probably-just-the-dev-team’s-friends vibe from the first one? It was almost Men of War quality!
06/03/2013 at 13:33 Atic Atac says:
Still way to creeped out by Father-Mother to be able to come close to this one :/
06/03/2013 at 15:16 gritz says:
Someone give these people millions of dollars to make this an open-world exploration game with the same combat and crazy awesome design. Please.
06/03/2013 at 17:17 maninahat says:
I’m told that Zeno Clash 2 will be somewhat open world. I saw a map and upgrade screen in the trailer.
06/03/2013 at 20:09 The Random One says:
*reads alt text*
That’s the second biggest one of those things I’ve ever seen.
06/03/2013 at 21:55 Ostymandias says:
this trailer
it’s like i’m really in Poland
07/03/2013 at 03:11 Devan says:
I’ll definitely be picking this up. The first game was quite the experience and I appreciate the additions the team made post-ship. I know that the sequel won’t be as paradigm-shifting because I know what to expect (or do I?), but it’ll be worth it for the punching and the wacky dialogue even if the story/environment doesn’t satisfy (which it probably will).
07/03/2013 at 15:26 Wedge says:
First person pile driving has happened at last. Thank you ACE Team.