With PAX East over, I have been anxiously awaiting Shadows of the Damned: Hella Remastered on the way later this year. Suda51 has long been one of, if not the most intriguing, developers in gaming. His work always combines incredibly unique and wacky stories with exciting and out-there game mechanics that really shouldn’t work. But time and time again, Suda51 manages to put out these incredible titles that just kind of work together.
Suda51 is known for working on and creating many popular titles like Killer7, Lollipop Chainsaw, Fatal Frame: Mask of the Lunar Eclipse, and No More Heroes. At the Tokyo Game Show 2023, we also saw a peek at his upcoming collaboration with SWERY65, Hotel Barcelona, which is due out later this year.
However, we haven’t really gotten a taste of Suda51’s odd game style lately. The last game we saw from Suda51 was No More Heroes 3, which scored well in our review here on CGMagazine. Even with Hotel Barcelona on the way, while we were over at PAX East, we were able to sit down with Goichi Suda (Suda51) and talk about the upcoming remaster of Shadows of the Damned: Hella Remastered and bringing one of my favourite Suda51 games to a modern generation.
Where did the decision come from to remaster Shadows of the Damned of all titles?
Goichi Suda: Actually, a remastered version of Shadows of the Damned has something that I have been wanting to do for a long time. The original only came out on PS3 and Xbox 360. So, I feel that not as many people have seen it or had a chance to play it. So, I spoke to EA about it a long time ago, and they were cool with it. But it would have to be on Origin [EA’s PC launcher]. And so I figured it’s only going to be on Origin, which doesn’t really help spread the audience base, so I passed on it.
A few years went by, and I still wanted to do it ever since. The Origin thing was no longer an issue, so I talked to EA about it again; they were super cooperative and basically said, “Yeah, cool, let’s do it.” Okay, now that we are able to make a multi-platform remaster, I am super stocked for it.
Are there any plans to remaster any other Suda51 games?
Goichi Suda: It’s definitely something I think about a lot. I have a lot of ideas on what games to remaster as well as what games could be remastered. What both Grasshopper and I would like to do is go back and catalogue and refine our games. Making sure that they’re available so that people can play them. But it gets really difficult sometimes. Do you know who has the rights to this game? Okay, it’s this company, where are they? Are they cool with us? So it’s definitely something we are considering and working towards, but it’s a bit too early to say. But there’s a pretty high chance that similar stuff will be coming out at some point.
“If the Shadows of the Damned remastered version sells well enough, I would consider making a proper sequel.”
So there’s always this kind of sideline horror theme in a lot of Grasshopper’s games. Do you have any interest in making it the main focal point of a game?
Goichi Suda: To be honest, there’s a bit of, I’m trying to be more appropriate, but I am a bit of a p****. So I get really scared and really freaked out by, like, you know, by really scary s***. So, I am not sure I could actually handle making a pure horror game. I would freak myself out too much.
With the Shadows of the Damned: Hella Remastered coming out this year, is there any plan to continue that storyline? Because there is a very big cliffhanger at the end of the game.
Goichi Suda: If the Shadows of the Damned remastered version sells well enough, I would consider making a proper sequel.
Now, the mind trips you send people on while playing your games can be a lot. Are you on anything when brainstorming ideas for these wild games?
Goichi Suda: I actually get asked that a lot. To be honest, even if I wanted to, I probably couldn’t. I don’t even smoke at all anymore, and I can’t hold my liquor that well anymore. On top of that, Japan is really strict about stuff like that. Not only legally but also in the industry. If you get caught with dope or something like that, there’s a really high chance that you’re basically going to be just completely ostracized from the industry. I don’t seem to need it anyway!
Shadows of the Damned: Hella Remastered will release sometime in 2024 on Steam, Xbox One, Xbox Series X|S, PlayStation 4, PlayStation 5 and Nintendo Switch.
