Have You Played? is an endless stream of game recommendations. One a day, every day of the year, perhaps for all time.
Remember the multiplayer mode in Jedi Knight II: Jedi Outcast? It inspired a well-known piece of games writing, about the etiquette that its tight, frantic lightsaber duels inspired. Blade Symphony is a whole game built upon that multiplayer mode, with a more nuanced combat system than its obvious inspiration, and a better version of the same spirited community.
Blade Symphony is the sort of name I can’t help but appreciate. It is blunt yet majestic, giving us a crimson-flavored taste of exactly what we’re going to get (swords!) paired with a certain high-class flourish, an alluring suggestion that this is far, far more than mere cyber-ninjas dueling each other into awesome giblets. One day, I will name my child Blade Symphony, I think. That way, no one – and I mean no one – will mistake what he or she is all about. For now, though, the videogame of my future offspring’s namesake is available for all to play via Steam’s early access program. The Jedi-Knight-II-inspired showdown sim will run you a few bucks, but it looks quite intriguing, to say the least.
Gosh, it’s been a long time since we mentioned Blade Symphony, way back in the mists of mod-time. But following a successful Kickstarter the game is now in beta (backers have their access) and it’s soon to arrive on Valve’s big nozzle of game delivery. What is Blade Symphony? Well, it’s a sword-fighting game running on a modified version of the Portal 2 engine. Project lead Michael Chang explains his motivation: “I wanted to restore the glorious Jedi Knight II saber dueling combat from the mid-early 2000s and so I started a mod and began recruiting people.”
Needless to say, it looks pretty good, as you can see from the video below.
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