Platinum Sol Cresta

Yesterday, PlatinumGames revealed the fourth and final part of its much-hyped 'Platinum4' series of announcements, and the whole thing turned out to be an April Fools' joke. It didn't seem to sit particularly well with fans who were hoping for something more, but Hideki Kamiya has taken to social media to explain the thought process behind the whole thing.

In case you missed it, the prank teased an arcade machine for a new game called 'Sol Cresta', a made-up sequel to '80s side-scrolling shoot em ups Moon Cresta and Terra Cresta. On Twitter, Kamiya says that he hopes fans "were able to get a good laugh". His full statement can be found below (translation via Siliconera):

"We, PlatinumGames, went all-out for this year’s April Fools’ again. While I’m aware that we’re living in troubled times, as an entertainer there’s a part of me that just wants to cheer you all up, even if it’s just a little.

And a big thank you goes out to the folks at Hamster for their cooperation.

I’ve always had my own rules about April Fools’ jokes such as ‘make it obvious that it’s a lie’ and ‘make sure it doesn’t disappoint even if they know it’s a lie’ and so on. However, this time it was ‘make something that will get us (me?) excited’ and we went full stupid with it. I hope that you were able to get a good laugh and remind yourself that this is PlatinumGames."

Judging by the reactions of fans in the prank's YouTube comments, and indeed in our very own comment section yesterday, it sadly didn't seem to get viewers very excited at all. Instead, people were simply left wondering whether we'll still be getting a 'proper' fourth announcement in the future.

That still remains to be seen, but we sure hope there's something else up PlatinumGames' sleeve - for many, hyping up a joke won't quite cut it.

[source twitter.com, via siliconera.com]