Eternal Darkness

Eternal Darkness: Sanity's Requiem wasn't a commercial smash hit on GameCube, but it certainly had a notable impact on those that experienced it, becoming a name that still causes ripples of excitement among some Nintendo fans. Its unique approach and meta-elements delivered some genuine creativity, establishing it as a cult classic.

Developed by the now defunct Silicon Knights but owned by Nintendo, it seems the big N just won't let the brand die. It's now renewed the latest trademark on the Eternal Darkness name for the third time, after the second renewal in late 2014. The reason this gets fans excited is that the application sets "computer game software" and a whole load of variations on that theme as the target products, with "ongoing efforts" promised to use the trademark. This could be admin to stall and keep the trademark, or genuinely represent the fact that Nintendo is working on something game related for the Eternal Darkness brand.

On a related note Denis Dyack, who led Silicon Knights when it produced the GameCube original and attempted to Kickstart a spiritual successor - Shadow of the Eternals - with his former studio Precursor Games, has stated that it's a project still in the works under his current company, Quantum Entanglement Entertainment Inc. This company was established in October 2014 and is seeking to work in TV and film, in addition to video game development. Speaking to Niche Gamer, it was made clear that Shadow of the Eternals could re-emerge in some form, but Dyack is keen to avoid promising timelines or further details at present.

Rather than tease, I would just say that we believe in the project and we're doing everything we can to see this project – and other projects – some of which are really great as well, get out there. We've got some big plans for the future, and we're being very aggressive on some things, and we're really looking forward to see how things roll out.

Ultimately, at present neither Eternal Darkness nor its Dyack-driven spiritual successor is visibly active. At least in the case of the Nintendo trademark we can continue to have some minor hope of these filings representing a current project. Cue excitable E3 hype in 5, 4, 3, 2, 1...

Thanks to all that sent these in.

[source tsdr.uspto.gov, via neogaf.com, nichegamer.com]