Enslaved takes place more than 150 years in the future, where the world has been transformed into a wasteland populated by the remnants of humanity and robots from wars long past. Brutish loner Monkey and tech-savvy female AI Trip find themselves forming an uneasy alliance when they find themselves upon a slave ship rumored to take prisoners to the West, never to be seen again. You'll have to use Trip's brains and Monkey's brawn to survive everything the post-apocalypse has to throw at you.

The game is being produced by Andy Serkis of Gollum fame, who also contributed to the script and voice casting, taking the lead role of Monkey for himself.

The game is due out in 2010 for the PlayStation 3 and Xbox 360. Enjoy the first screens, as we try to figure out why no one loves us pre-apocalyptic folk anymore.

According to the newest issue of Game Informer magazine, Enslaved is a "post-apocalyptic journey" and.... well, that's about all we know about the game. We're sure there's much more to it than that, but the magazine's cover seems far more interested in revealing details on Iron Man 2. Oh, I'm sorry, I meant Crackdown 2.

GI does make mention of Crackdown 2's multiplayer modes — four-player co-op and 16-player competitive matches, they tease — but doesn't offer much more than a bit about the game having a "dark new story."

October Issue Revealed [Game Informer]

Namco Bandai execs also failed to provide any further details, unfortunately, only going as far as to announce the relationship. While we've known that Ninja Theory was going multi-platform for its next release, we didn't know who would be publishing. It's another move toward expanding Namco Bandai's Western development, something we expect to continue.

What's unclear is how long the relationship is planned to last. Namco has only confirmed it will publish one title from the UK developer.

"I think it is fair to say that we do not comment on rumour and speculation, especially about games that have never been announced," said SCEE corporate PR manager Nick Caplin.

Caplin did tell us, though, some detail behind why Eight Days and Getaway 3 were scrapped, and why we oughtn't worry about SCEE:

"Regarding 8 Days and The Getaway, we review the progress and viability of games on a regular basis taking into account feedback from within WWS [worldwide studios] and all the RHQs [regional headquarters], and at our latest review, felt that the budget and resources required to complete these games could be more beneficial elsewhere."

Moreover, Caplin said there's no trouble on the European front. "We are still dedicated to our first-party studios and are very excited about the fantastic exclusive titles coming this year, such as LittleBigPlanet, Resistance 2 and Motorstorm: Pacific Rift, as well as some very exciting titles coming in the near future."

" Please note that LBP, Motorstorm: Pacific Rift and Killzone 2 are all from European studios," said Caplin.

An inside UK source tells us that Heavenly Sword 2 has been canned by Sony Computer Entertainment of Europe. The game was axed after months in development because it is no longer seen as commercially viable, our source tells us.

The news came during an emergency meeting set up for the Sony Cambridge team which was working on the game.

On a side note, Ninja Theory, who have already said they weren't working on the sequel to their Playstation 3 exclusive, have grown increasingly bitter about their treatment at Sony's hands, our source tells us. I'm told that the development studio, which once had offices in the same building as Sony Cambridge, have started packing up to move to a new location.

I guess when they said they wanted to move away from Sony and get into multi-platform development they weren't kidding.

If true, this marks the third major project, counting Eight Days and Getaway 3, that has been canned by SCEE. Is the Europe arm of Sony in trouble? No clue, but we've asked for comment.

We see an entirely different area of progress: a form of independent production based on real-time game engine technology. We reckon you could do something like Beowulf for 15-20 per cent of the cost... If you are already creating hi-res assets for a game, then sharing these can bring that cost down even further... We have a lot of experience in performance capture, animation, rendering and so on. We can compete in the same way that indie films can live alongside blockbusters.

20 percent of the cost is dandy and all, Ninja Theory, but would your film have Angelina Jolie? Well.

Make Beowulf [Games Industry]

It's a brutal environment out there for an independent, particularly considering the size of the games that we're developing... But we've now signed up the new game and the future looks pretty rosy for us... our new game is going to be PS3 and Xbox 360.

Ninja Theory co-founder Nina Kristensen says her company may also have a movie in the works, a totally CGI affair "using the game engine alongside the game itself." Sounds interesting. At least more interesting than, say, Final Fantasy: Spirits Within.

Ninja Theory considers CGI movie alongside new multiformat title [GamesIndustry.biz]

Instead of making some stupid cabinet or a DVD shelf like the rest of the class, I decided to make something a little more original...Ironical, I was the first one to get cut by my sword. I let a kid hold it and he got a little power hungry, started swinging it around and cut my in the arm. For a wooden sword, it sure cuts well.

Cake-loving home ec students, we're looking in your direction for a proper rebuttal.

Real Life Heavenly Sword [GameGrep via PS3Fanboy]

They initially asked for video game background, then they had a follow-up phone call asking which games I had played or owned, focusing heavily on Heavenly Sword. There were 3 surveys done on Monday, groups of 6 for the first 2, 4 for the last group (my group). Predominantly males, asking about our impressions on Prince of Persia, God of War, Ninja Gaiden and, of course, Heavenly Sword. Some questions were asked about why Heavenly Sword didn't sell so well, what our impressions were on the gameplay, how the cutscenes were done, combat mechanics.

At the end of the night they gave us a few pieces of paper and asked our takes on the ideas (probably already set in stone). The following are the sheets that they asked our opinions on:

1. Heavenly sword 2 will take place 10 years after the events in heavenly sword 1

2. The main character will be a male with martial arts background

3. The main character will be Kai, but she will be a more mature woman.

4. The game will require you to master different martial arts styles before retrieving the heavenly sword

5. The game will, instead of button mashing, have controls that utilize an analog stick to go through weapons.

6. The game will have downloadable weapons, characters, and enemies to customize your experience.

7. The game will be more interactive with the environment

8. The game will have you on a storyline with replayable missions, as opposed to an open world

Right now we're working on an exciting new concept that has got everyone we talk to buzzing. We can't say a lot except that it's going to be great to work on and should be even better to play! It'll take all the things we loved about Heavenly Sword and make them bigger and better than ever before.

So that was pretty sad in Heavenly Sword when red-headed Nariko croaked, huh? No worries! Just because she's dead, doesn't mean she's dead — especially in a game called Heavenly Sword. Says Nina Kristensen from developer Ninja Theory:

The beautiful thing about inventing a universe like that of Heavenly Sword is that you get to make up all the rules and happily, in the Heavenly Sword universe, just because you're dead, it doesn't mean your life is over ;)

...We haven't announced anything as yet but I can confirm that when we wrote the original story we did write it as a trilogy...

So hit the jump for our Frankenreview: the one review that will dictate whether or not the PS3 is good for something other than big screen porn. That is, if you don't consider a beautiful redhead kicking royal ass in skimpy clothing to be some logical extension of pornography.

GameRevolution
I can not remember the last time I cared so much about the characters in an action game, and not just the heroes, the villains as well. Like Gollum, even the bad guys have complex motivations. The facial expressions, body language, and the lip synch are so spot-on it's uncanny. I found myself actually excited for more story exposition, rather than disappointed I was dropping out of the action.

GameInformer
From the moment Nariko chooses to wield the Heavenly Sword, her time with it is limited. As a player, your experience with the sword will also be fairly short; most gamers will probably finish the game in about seven or eight hours. However, that timeframe is dense with non-stop thrills thanks to the game's ability to continually throw compelling new challenges in front of you.

IGN
The game's biggest strength is its combat system, which in large part works very well. Instead of using only face buttons to put together combos, you have three different stances that each has its own set of moves...Unfortunately, in most one-on-one battles it makes most sense to mostly stick with Triangle as it doubles for a move-breaking counter attack. The more often you use Triangle, the more likely you are to unknowingly counter an enemy's attack and come back with an instant-kill finishing move.

Eurogamer
Now and then Heavenly Sword takes a break from all the hackandslash guff and lets you shoot at things from big cannons...In these hugely entertaining (but rather samey) interludes you can...hold down L1 and effectively steer the missile directly to its target. By default, the game encourages you to use the SixAxis tilt controls, but although it feels rather fantastic when you wobble your pad to your target, it's horribly imprecise. After a few hours of struggling with it, we couldn't quite believe how much easier it was to control the direction with the analogue stick in comparison

Pro-G
If you are looking for a purist's hack and slash that will test you for months, go elsewhere, ideally to Ninja Gaiden Sigma. But if you want a thrilling and cinematic adventure that will give you ample opportunity to show off the muscle of your PlayStation 3 and provide a glimpse of the console's possible future, you could do far worse than pick up this big-budget epic.
Penny Arcade pointed out that Heavenly Sword reviews (specifically 1UP's) read like a struggling game with an 8 tagged on. And while I agree that Heavenly Sword is certainly sandbagging a bit with the PS3's currently high handicap, I think the reviewers were so generous despite length and mechanic issues because of the game's extremely high level of cinematic polish. Either way, the fanboys can dry their tears.

What they don't explain in the article, unfortunately for storage format war purposes, is whether that 10 GB footprint of sound takes up that much space on a Blu-ray disc. Is that the final compressed size? Or is that the master recording data? Semi-official Sony blog ThreeSpeech says says it's the former, so it's possible they took advantage of the extra storage and left much of it uncompressed.

If they're accurate, that's huge.

Heard About: Heavenly Sword [Develop]

This clip was originally intended to be for PlayStation G.A.P. members only, but has thankfully found its way to the internet for us all to enjoy. This first in a series of animated looks at the story behind Ninja Theory's Heavenly Sword, it features some striking, if somewhat familiar, looking artwork. We can only hope that these clips will eventually find their way to the PlayStation Store (and the Heavenly Sword disc, as well).

The Ninja Theory folks blog that the demo for Heavenly Sword is finished and now it's just a matter of Sony deciding when to release the thing on the public.

People at home really want to get hands on too. Well, let me just tell you all that the dev team has finished work on the demo.. that's it... it's in the bag... so now it's a case of Sony deciding when they feel is the best time to release it to PlayStation Network.

The team is, according to the blog, now in the "closing stage of development" for the full game meaning that they are fixing bugs and then it's golden.

E3 07 onwards!!!!!!! [Ninja Theory]

I can confirm that we are, of course, going to be releasing a demo for Heavenly Sword...and soon! This will be downloadable via the Playstation Network...so keep an eye out for this in the very near future...and i mean very near future!

Hmm. Say like, next week? Possibly the day after Sony's E3 keynote with the regular PlayStation Store update? I'll put my virtual money on that.

Mat also provides some technical details—the game will run in 720p, will not ship with a special edition SKU, will not feature any platforming—and additional insight in his blog.

Welcome to Ninja Theory! [IGN via N4G]

The Playstation blog entry is a 13 question Q&A about the game and the upcoming E3. In it Ninja Theory co-founder Nina Kristensen talks up the game's storyline and distinctly artistic approach to over-the-top sword combat. A selection:

4. What do you think is the coolest aspect of this game? The super-style moves are the coolest. They're big and dramatic, you have to work quite hard to get them (especially the level 3 ones) and they completely annihilate the enemy. It's just so much fun. My personal fav is the one where you drag a guy massively up into the air, ride him back down, slam him into the floor, and while you're cart wheeling off him, a huge shockwave from his impact with the floor wipes out everyone else.

5. Describe it in five words or less.
Big Sword, Hot Girl!!

The IGN Heavenly Sword blog talks a bit more about play mechanics, in particular they break down and explain the different stances you can use in the game:

In play, your main weapon is the Heavenly Sword itself. It comes in three stances which you can switch between on the fly to create your own combos and fighting style.

Speed Stance has the sword split into two blades. It's fast, technical and has a lot of depth to it. It's good in one-on-one fights against skillful opponents but deeper combos hold the key to unlocking defenses and delivering massive damage.

Power Stance has the sword blades join to form one huge powerful sword. It's slow and powerful and great against tougher enemies or to break enemy defences.

Range Stance has the sword's blades extend from its handles with chains. It's the weakest of the three stances but it covers a large and wide area. It's great for taking out lots of enemies or knocking them into the air for follow-on aerial combos. It can also be used to sweep debris at enemies.

My indifference and concern over the game's progress is steadily decaying. I just hope they deliver at E3.

GamePro has posted ten new shots of Ninja Theory's hack and slash awesomeness and it's looking better and better every time I see it, making me wonder if the Square-Enix graphics wizards are going to outshine it.

Better than Pixar? No way. Better than Square's abyssmal Final Fantasy flick? Still, no. But heavenly? Definitely. Look at all those people! If that's in-game, color me impressed. Michael McWhertor

Heavenly Sword Week begins [GamePro]

In-game? No way, you say. But the Ninja Theory folks say otherwise, with one caveat. The screen has been touched up by being "resized a little and with some blurring around the edges so it's perfect as a desktop wallpaper." Interested in using it as such? The 1280 x 1024 full-size shot is linked below.

There's little doubt this game looks good, but we remain suspicious. However, we cannot wait to be proven wrong. Bring it on, Ninja Theory. Michael McWhertor

New HS Screenshot [Ninja Theory Forums]