At Playstation Experience in Las Vegas Sony kicked off their show with a rather lengthy look at a slew of new games coming to various Sony platforms, but it might have been the game they ended with that was the most unique thing they showed off at their keynote. This game is called Drawn to Death, and it is a multiplayer third person arena shooter from a team called The Bartlet Jones Supernatural Detective Agency in collaboration with Sony San Diego. There is a good chance you have not heard of this studio, but that is to be expected considering they have never made a game. You may know the person that hatched this idea though, he is the Game Director on Drawn to Death and his name is David Jaffe.
David Jaffe is an industry veteran that has a made name for himself making various Sony exclusives like Twisted Metal and God of War, so it should come as no surprise as to why him making a new game is a big deal. Drawn to Death is something much different for him though, in fact it is much different from all the multiplayer shooters currently on the market.
Since Drawn to Death is still in Pre-Alpha not too much was shown off besides their main mode which is a four player free for all, but what makes it unique is the way the game plays. The entire game takes place in a high school student’s notebook which is why every aspect is hand drawn, and its also why the game is full of complete and utter chaos and absurdity. From what we have seen so far there are four different characters to choose from, each of which have a very different set of abilities. In my demo of the game I chose Cyborgula, a cyborg vampire mix that had the ability to fly and shoot rockets out of his head. The other characters included Johnny Savage, a punk rocker who threw dodge balls and had a guitar for a melee weapon, Diabla Tijuana, a western she-devil that could bounce off pentagrams, and Alan, a killer teddy bear that could go invisible and throw chainsaws.
immediately after being dropped into game the chaos began, everything was so fast and frantic it was almost hard to comprehend everything I had at my disposal. I was soaring through the air chasing Johnny Savage with the “F*ck you 47” when a hand pops through the level grabs and Diabla Tijuana, she then proceeds to pilot it and uses it as a weapon to kill of all us. That was just one of the many “hand job” pickups that involve the student sticking his hand in the level to help you out in some interesting sort of way. The game is absolutely littered with pickups and specials scattered all over the cleverly designed map.
One of my favorite things about Drawn To Death is the way it keeps score. You gain a point for a kill and lose a point for a death. So despite all the chaos this game brings you need to kill people and survive to win. When you do die it also has a clever way of respawning you into the game, it gives you a choice. You can drop right away, but only have around half health or wait it out till you have full health and then drop back in. It becomes a tough decision to make because the game is so fast you wanna jump right back in after you die, but there is a penalty for that.
I could go on and on about how crazy this game is, but to be honest in my play time I couldn’t even grasp everything that was going on in the game, and that is in no way a knock to the game. I loved what I played of Drawn to Death, and I honestly cannot wait to see how this game shapes up over the next year. David Jaffe and Sony may have a real winner with this multiplayer shooter.
