Epic Games, Inc. announces an agreement with Tecmo Koei Games to license Epic’s award-winning Unreal Engine 3 technology for the development of YAIBA: NINJA GAIDEN Z, the upcoming zombie/ninja game from Team Ninja.
The agreement was brokered by Epic Games Japan, which supports the company’s licensees locally.
Keiji Inafune, founder and chief executive officer of Comcept, and developer Spark Unlimited, will be working with renowned development team Team Ninja to bring us a truly new take on the Ninja Gaiden franchise. And yes, that’s the same Keiji Inafune who made Mega Man.
“We couldn’t be happier to develop ‘YAIBA: NINJA GAIDEN Z’ on Unreal Engine 3 “In the past I have been involved with numerous projects built upon Unreal Engine 3, so I understand its benefits and reliability. Unreal allows us to focus on making the game fun, and to push the boundaries of visuals and gameplay in the shortest time possible.”
How might this engine do such a thing? Well, working with a versatile engine like Unreal Engine 3, that the developers are familiar with, will let them create rapid iterations of the play mechanics, which will lead to extremely manageable fine tuning of the games more delicate features.
Yosuke Hayashi, studio head of Team NINJA stated:
“‘YAIBA: NINJA GAIDEN Z’ is not a sequel. It is a new experience for gamers. As with any new title, there are many new challenges, from the game design to art style and even development team structure. Unreal Engine 3 is a great ally to have when taking on those challenges. Unreal Engine allows us to quickly and efficiently iterate on countless ideas, and ‘YAIBA’ is now taking on a life of its own. We can’t wait until gamers everywhere get their hands on the ultimate ninja zombie experience.”
If “ultimate ninja zombie experience” doesn’t wet the gullet of a good number of you, then I don’t know this reader base as well as I think I do…
