Harker from The Collective (Xbox 360, PS3, Wii) - Spiritual successor to Buffy

[Romier S]

So the second Buffy game sucked all kinds of ass. Which was a huge disappointment for those of us that played and loved the original game. The developer of the original Buffy was of course The Collective who went on to make a decent Indiana Jones and hasn't made much of anything worthy of note since (at least IMHO). It looks like they are finally returning to form with thier new game Harker. The game is a vampire based survival horror game that focuses on strategic hand to hand combat.

 

The folks at the Collective are themselves comparing the game to Buffy which gives me a great deal of hope that this game will end up being great. 1up.com has a preview and some screenshots which you can read/view below:

 

http://www.1up.com/do/previewPage?cId=3154706

 

Adding to the drama of each fight, your attacks won't all be one-hit kills. If you pick up a crossbow in the game, it won't just act like a machine gun, taking out five guys in five seconds. Instead, as Cook explains, you have to take the time to load the ammunition before you can use it to nail an enemy into a wall. And that's only the beginning of the fight. "We've got vampires here, and they're not normal human beings; they are super human in that sense, so they have this way to dynamically heal," says Cook. "They'll pull themselves slowly off the wall, stand back up, heal up and suddenly they're back at 50% health. So you've got this dilemma... which one do I pin, which one do I use range on, and which one do I go in for an execution on?"

 

For Harker, "executions" can be set up with your weapon or via the environments -- pull out your fists, push someone slowly into a spike on the wall, throw someone into a spiked pit, etc. "It's not Buffy because she would just push them and walk away and they are dead," says Cook. "Harker -- no -- he goes up and looks in their face, grabs their hair and rips it out, and pushes them really slowly through this object."

 

"In Buffy it was really satisfying to throw a stake at a vampire, [or] to throw a vampire into a stake in the environment," says Harker lead programmer David Byttow. "These were really satisfying moments and we're just taking that a step further -- drawing it out. Making it more gruesome, more fun, more brutal."

 

[ATTACH]2438[/ATTACH]

 

[ATTACH]2439[/ATTACH]

 

[ATTACH]2440[/ATTACH]

 

[ATTACH]2441[/ATTACH]

[Magness]

Hmmm original Buffy was a great Beat-Em-Up game... And Indy and Emperor's Tomb was a solid adventure game. So if Harker is at all similiar that should be cool. Although I think I'd need a demo of this one to be sure.

[dogbert]

Yep, it was the demo of Buffy that sold me on that game. The Collective is so big & sprawling now as a company, it's not obvious that it's the same core team behind it as Buffy so I'll take a wait & see approach on how the game turns out. Going by the article, it's Buffy in spirit, not in gameplay.

[foogledricks]

I enjoyed Buffy greatly. Though I bought and tried Indiana Jones after I played Ninja Gaiden so I couldn't get far without being bored. Not the games fault, just timing.

[bickle]

The game is only about five months into development at this point

 

ARGGH!

[EnemaEms]

Saw this on the 1up Show last week and it was my 1st exposure to it. Looks fun. I like that they are going for a hunting angle in the game. Hunting down vampires will be very fun.

 

-Dean-

[Romier S]

Here's a new trailer for Harker:

 

Harker HD Footage (MOV)

Harker HD Footage (WMV)

[PHiL]

I think i might just have to pick this one up:tu

[Romier S]

/Thread resurrection...

 

Don't look for Harker to come out anytime soon...

 

Harker placed on indefinite hold

 

Foundation 9 has told Eurogamer that work on its vampire-hunting title Harker has been put on indefinite hold.

 

According to a spokesperson, the team creating it has been put in charge of working on Silent Hill V for Konami under new name Double Helix. It might have called, or left a note.

 

The Collective was formerly in charge of Harker, before it merged with Backbone Entertainment in 2005 to become Foundation 9.

 

Harker cast you in the role of vampire hunter Jonathan Harker, who had the rather challenging job of ridding Victorian Europe of demons with pointy teeth and stiff collars.

 

It was being developed for PS3, 360 and Wii - the "next-gen trio" - and boasted dazzling features such as realistic day-to-night lighting, gory combat, dynamic creature transformation and snazzy demon-hunting gear.

 

Perhaps there was simply too much at stake.