Granzella acquires Disaster Report

[theSovietConnection]

While I know the Disaster Report series isn't terribly popular/well known, I thought I'd share this for those of us on here that do like the games.

After the 2011 Tohoku earthqauke and tsunami, Irem cancelled the scheduled fourth entry in the series, shortly before essentially closing their software development wing, leaving the future of many series' in doubt.

However, in the December issue of Famitsu, Granzella, a studio founded by former Irem developer Kazumo Kujo, revealed they had purchased the copyright to the Disaster Report IP from Irem. The newest entry in the Disaster Report series is now reportedly scheduled for release in Fall 2015.

On a personal level, I am extremely happy to see this turn of events, and hope that Irem may also prove willing to part with the copyright to the Steambot Chronicles series as well, so that a new entry in that series might be possible.

Source. [http://gematsu.com/2014/12/granzella-acquires-disaster-report-copyright-latest-entry-planned-fall-2015]

 

[Frezzato]

I think I found a LP of the first Disaster Report at random on YouTube. It was really interesting to me that a dev created a pure survival game, which today seems unheard of. I can imagine people, devs, critics--everyone--just looking at the original concept and thinking, "Where are the monsters? Are there roving gangs? Who's the love interest?", but they'd be missing the point. I don't think there are enough games that follow one, simple concept and explore to the limit of those boundaries.

I guess I'm at a point now where I have probably too many games and have started seeking out interesting examples regardless of the quality. Well, perhaps 'merit' is the more accurate word, but I honestly don't mean for that to sound pejorative. Some recent examples would be:

• 
  Hydrophobia - I bought this when someone posted an image here as an example of water physics in games.
  
  Remember Me - I always wanted this game and I've never seen refuse and filth in a game look so authentic, plus the art direction overall is fantastic.
  
  SSX - I don't like snowboarding/surfing/skateboarding or anything like that, but there's something about sliding down a mountain that just appeals to me. SSX does exactly what games should do, which is take a concept and create an impossible world for it, full of impossible actions, in a playground of your dreams.
  
  Brothers: A Tale of Two Sons - You can tell the dev really wanted to make a game where you control two characters at once. I can appreciate that. Hell, I bought it twice.

And now Disaster Report, where you have to survive, explore, escape. Oh right, and the idea of having to find and drink water. That was pretty unheard of in games back then. Here's to hoping it gets distributed outside of Japan, if it ever gets made.

 

[theSovietConnection]

And now Disaster Report, where you have to survive, explore, escape. Oh right, and the idea of having to find and drink water. That was pretty unheard of in games back then. Here's to hoping it gets distributed outside of Japan, if it ever gets made.

I can't remember where it was I read it, but I do remember reading that, contrary to it's Wikipedia article, Disaster Report 4 was going to be less about escaping a city that was being destroyed, and more about adapting to life within a city that had been ravaged by a natural disaster. Even if it isn't true, I think that could make for a really interesting game, if someone were to make one like that.