If you thought the original Shank was a top-notch Xbox Live Arcade title, then you’ll be pleasantly surprised to know that Shank 2 will top the top-notchness of the original by a fair degree. Klei Entertainment’s CEO, Jamie Cheng, shared a few thoughts and a lot of information about the upcoming side-scrolling sequel to the smash-hit indie game that rocked Xbox Live, PSN and PC last year.
Speaking with XBLA Fans, Jamie stated that…
“We […] ended up with about twice the amount of animation to support things like the added combat systems, more enemy types and two separate, playable characters…” “…we’ve added to the combat by introducing two new mechanics. First is the counter moves, where players time their grabs and execute a reversal on the enemy. The second is that Shank now picks up weapons dropped by enemies, which lets you mix up your combat as you use limited time items, just like the good old times in Double Dragon. Except in Double Dragon you don’t get to decapitate a guy with their own shovel.”
Cheng also mentions that co-op has been revamped this time around supporting more than just the standard local co-op campaign. In Shank 2 players are able to go online now and team up with a buddy to play through the game or partake in the new Survival mode where two players will take on wave-after-wave of increasingly difficult enemies.
The control scheme has also been reworked, mimicking shooters more like Metal Assault or standard 360 side-scrollers, with the right-analog to dodge, the digital pad used for movement and 360 degree aiming for the shooting mechanics. Also, ‘X’ is no longer to pick stuff up.
Shank 2 is scheduled for release early in 2012. You can check out the entire interview over at XBLA Fans.
