Triple-I Games - a development studio made up of veterans from BioWare, ArenaNet, and Sucker Punch - is bringing a new action-adventure game to Switch called Hindsight 20/20.
The game is a single-player affair with morality-based decisions seemingly at its core. These decisions you make will have long-lasting repercussions and the game deals with some pretty serious topics; it's said to explore "themes of morality at times of crisis, segregation, regret, peace, and self-criticism", with the press release talking of a scene where a character is considering suicide as just one example.
Here's some PR:
The peaceful town of Champaner holds life sacred above all else. A calamitous virus capable of turning people into blood-thirsty beasts called Raakshasas threatens Champaner’s harmonious ways. In response, King Marcos orders the kidnapping and execution of all Raakshasas including Seth, the leader of the beasts. Seth flees and forms a rival town called Gibsonia, a safe haven for anyone who has or could turn into a Raakshasa. He then opens a powerful rift over Champaner, capable of destroying the kingdom at any time.
At the center of this developing war is a fated one-armed man named Jehan who lived in Champaner, until his father was killed. Jehan’s malleability and freedom of choice form the crux of Hindsight 20/20. Will he uphold the values of his hometown by avoiding bloodshed? Or will the murder of his father fuel him with a rage that can only be quelled with the death of those responsible? Perhaps there is a middle ground, where violence justifies a peaceful end. Survive in a world of grey by deciding who Jehan really is and what motivates him.
Also mentioned in the press release are environmental puzzles, side quests, and a "fantastical world that merges technology and magic". The stylised aesthetic is also said to be inspired by classic Zelda games, just in case you needed any more persuading to keep this one on your radar.
The game is scheduled for a 2020 release (we see what they did there) on Nintendo Switch, as well as other major platforms. We'll make sure to keep an eye out for more news on this one going forward.
As always, make sure to let us know what you think in our lovely comment section below.
Comments 51
This reminds me a bit of the original Fable. Hopefully this meets the expectations set by this trailer. Should be a good game if so, adding to watch list.
Wow. This looked pretty bad.
This is about as Zelda inspired as Minecraft.
" veterans from BioWare" "morality-based decisions seemingly at its core"
You find a group of starving children ekeing out an existence outside of the city walls. Do you:
a) Give them every single bit of money you have
b) Murder them all while laughing
It looks a bit bland and not at all like Zelda. It also doesn't bode well that their logo (the three i's) looks like something you'd make in Paint and IMO very unprofessional.
Horrible names, all of them. Both for the locations and the characters. Very uninspired, and nothing that piques my interest. Story is key, and if it doesn't grab me, then nothing else matters.
Nothing about this game looks "inspired by Zelda" at all. It almost feels like they're just mentioning Zelda to garner attention. The actual game doesn't look too bad, but it's definitely not like Zelda.
Am I the only one who hates seeing blood in video games? It's just nasty.
Sorry to say it but it looks to be lacking in personality - it’s still early days though.
@sketchturner yea i haven't played a bloody video game until bayonetta on switch, i got used to it but it still was a really weird feeling at first. same year i played bravely default and was the first game i played that really overacted the death though the cast hilariously took a while to acknowledge it.
I've seen PS2 games with better graphics.
@tr573 these morality things do tend to lack even the remotest nuance. They really need for you to come back and find they're all dead from overdoses after you give them all your money or that a thousand fantastic farmers can finally escape the sewers after you kill all the kids and end their reign of terror.
Edit to add: I just realised that I would absolutely LOVE a game where almost every decent thing you tried to do ended up with something terrible happening. You feed the starving cat, it uses it's last bit of strength to hunt its only prey animal to extinction thus dooming its entire species.
i was bothered that the character is just using 2 melee weapons, took me a while to notice it's lethal sword vs non-lethal stun baton, hope the combat would have more options than that. i wonder if this is gonna be one of those games that's intended to be replayed to see how combinations of choices work rather than satisfying on 1 playthrough
Sounds more like its inspired by Dishonored and Ultima: Quest of the Avatar. I'll pass, it doesn't look or sound all that intriguing.
The game actually looks pretty cool. Ill check it out next year possibly.
You kill the despicable crime lord that rules the citadel with an iron fist and the power vacuum leads to mindless and random violence, killing the only person who knows how to repair the oxygen reclaimers. Your new quest is to sort that out.
You accept the mission to find the new reagent the scientist needs to create a vaccine. You find it and the new vaccine reverts to virulence and now the disease kills fifty percent of the population rather than five.
The game could be called Good Intentions or Grey Area.
Looks like Fable with a bland artstyle. I wish there was more nuance to these morality games but I'll wait on reviews.
These days everything is "Zelda" inspired. It probably helps promoting other games.
I think the morality aspect sounds interesting, if they can display and keep the consequences in-game. Deffinately not remotely Zelda-esque at all (click bait?). Blood looks OK. Tbh I'm more concerned about the blood & gore in Mortal Combat. This looks tame.
Looks horrific, the combat has me slightly interested, but besides that they'll have to work a lot on this. Of course it's a teaser, but still.
Wow...it looks a bit on the rubbish side lol
@ryancraddock please take a look at all those that felt the need to point out how misleading the “Zelda-inspired” part, and tell me how that is not clickbait.
If it had been only me, I wouldn’t have said anything, I swear.
So far, no thanks. Not feeling the combat or art design. I don’t care about blood in video games, but it seems misplaced/inappropriate here. Oh well, more money in my pocket.
Sucker Punch... there's a name I haven't heard in a long while. First thing I thought about was Fable with the morality. As for the trailer, I didn't see a whole lot that blows me away, so it will take more than just the pedigree of devs to win me. I'll keep an eye out at least.
@DockEllisD That would be Shalnor Legends. Quite the "meh" Zelda inspired game.
@clvr The press release stated that the game's aesthetic was inspired by Zelda (as in, the game's publisher is marketing it as such and the development team has said that their work is inspired by the series).
This isn't something I've made up as "clickbait"; I'm simply reporting the fact that the game was inspired by Zelda, whether people feel that it is similar to it or not.
@ryancraddock fair enough, I’ve been had by them and not NL then; if that’s the case I apologize for jumping to conclusions.
@clvr No worries, thank you! We often get questioned or worse for things out of our control or - like in this case - accused of things that I personally think are unfounded. Just part of the job sadly!
We will never intentionally use clickbait or do anything even remotely shady; it's just not what we're about. I'd encourage any readers seeing this to point out anything that feels wrong to us, of course, but rest assured that we hate things like clickbait and weak journalism just as much as you do.
(Just tagging @DockEllisD and @spirit_flame so that they can see my explanation in my first reply above ^) 🙂
@tr573 A, because child killing is just sick.
Hmmmm. Still a while to go... Who knows?
However, I like the premise.
No thanks I’ll pass
@sketchturner You're not the only one, I hate seeing blood in games too.
"Zelda-inspired"
What? Inspired by the CD-I games maybe... All I see is the super annoying camera shaking, very simplistic graphics and boring gameplay.
Seems pretty bland and ambitionless for the pedigree of developers they name drop at the start of the article.
Is this what happens to devs when they get laid off from arenanet and biofail? Ouch.
It's almost as if devs think the Switch needs a Zelda game that actually feels like a Zelda game or something.
@Solid_Stannis Look, I'm all for more solid dungeons, but leaving the plateau in Breath of the Wild gave me the exact same feeling as a bit after leaving the sanctuary in Link to the Past, when you realize a huge world just opened up for you.
Terrible, this game . If don't was put the zelda name in marketing, maybe I don't was expecting so highquality, but like they used, is easy see how bad the game is.
Just can't wait to read over at PushSquare how the PS4 is getting a "zelda inspired" game for its library.
I guess if you never played Zelda - or seen a youTube video of someone playing Zelda
Not interested at all.
Looks pretty good to me. Not sure why everyone is hating on it.
This looks like a hard pass. I know others have said it looks good, but it just looks janky with gratuitous blood.
@ryancraddock A tiny objection here... Your article CAN actually be quite misleading. The only Zelda-inspired thing about the game, as mentioned in the full press release, is in its "stylized aesthetic".
But when reading the headline to your article, which says "Zelda-inspired", it paints a picture for a lot of us that it has to do with the gameplay or an overall inspiration (as is often the case when talking about Zelda-inspired games). So we click on the link to your article and find out it's purely aesthetical (as quoted by the full press release). Can you see that you make it a bit misleading in that regard?
Maybe you object to the idea of clickbait, but sometimes (just sometimes) you guys publish clickbaitesque articles, with suspicious, tabloid-like headlines. It might be unintentional in this case, but if I were you, I would change the headline to clarify exactly where the game is "Zelda-inspired", or remove the mention of Zelda completely from the headline, as it's just a small part of the overall game.
I'm not saying this to be mean. It's just a friendly recommendation to help bring up the quality of this site (which often is my Nintendo fansite of choice and you surely publish a lot of quality content as well).
But look for example how NintendoEverything tackled these news: no mention of Zelda in the headline. https://nintendoeverything.com/action-adventure-game-hindsight-20-20-announced-for-switch/
Much better!
The full quote from the press release:
"The stylized aesthetic inspired by classic Zelda games is punctuated with a wide-ranging musical sweep of tragedy, majesty, and primal forces."
So it looks nothing like Zelda, and that different "styles" just makes the whole game look confusing.
Major Pass on this one
Honestly from the trailer I don't see the Zelda inspiration, anyway the game seems interesting. It may be good. I'll keep an eye on it.
Redundant title, uninspired art design. And no, that god-awful camera shake doesn't make your cookie-cutter action appear more interesting, it just makes my head hurt.
So many games keep following the Mass Effect dialogue tree to the letter, which was fine years ago, but feels stale at this point.
@Cissero Its like a grittier lego game
@Realness More money in one's pocket is always good.
The choppy cadence of the attack animation is what bothered me the most, oddly enough. Hard pass. Nothing promising about that footage at all.
Looks like a Lego game. Looks very weak.
@ryancraddock No response to my comment #44? You don't have to, of course, but would be cool if you'd respond.
Have a nice weekend!
Fire your art director...and your game designer
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