If you’ve been honing your skills in a VR combat simulator but have been waiting to test your skills against swarms of the undead, your wait may soon be over with Undead Citadel, a zombie-filled action adventure title coming to SteamVR, Vive, Oculus and PSVR headsets at an unannounced time this year from developer Dark Curry.
The newly released combat trailer shows off swordplay that seems inspired by ‘The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim’, but with a natural fluidity and physics-based approach that’s similar to what we’ve seen so far from games like Blade & Sorcery. Weapons collide with one another in a believable way, but what’s most impressive and satisfying here is how bodies break apart when struck.
The trailer shows how naturally Undead Citadel lets you rip bones and limbs off of your undead adversaries; most notably at the 20 second mark, where the player launches an explosive device at a group of skeletons. Pay attention to how each skeleton goes flying as their legs and arms disintegrate.
The level of graphical fidelity and detail shown in the Undead Citadel trailer stands out, showing off just how good a VR game can look even when forcing the system to calculate a hefty number of physics operations. The shadows and textures presented in the trailer look on-par with those of a high-budget ‘flatscreen’ game from the last three years, but Dark Curry has also clearly put work into animating its undead horde; zombies and skeletons move with intention, making them feel tangible and intimidating. Whether or not the fidelity shown in the trailer is representative of the final product is unclear, but it’s expected that the team would be targeting the usual ‘VR Ready’ hardware specs.
All weapons shown off in the combat trailer are what you’d expect from any other medieval slasher, showcasing the standard arsenal of bows, blades, and blunt objects with which to enact mayhem. The addition of incendiary weapons like torches and bombs does tease creative possibilities for destroying enemies, as does the slow motion mechanic shown off at 0:45. Two-handed weapons like the mace at 0:40 also appear to have much more weight and handle more ‘correctly’ than two-handers implemented in similar games.
Dark Curry is promising the following features for Undead Citadel:
- Innovative hybrid physics-based combat engine.
- Smash or cut your enemies down with over 40+ different close combat weapons with real-life movements: swords, axes, war hammers, maces, shields, longswords or even your own fists.
- Take the undead down with ranged weaponry like javelins, bow and arrows, or blow them up with powerful explosives.
- Engage against dozens of different close combat, ranged or heavily armored enemy types.
- Find and use slow motion, strength, invulnerability or freeze magic potions to mutate your power and obliterate the dead ones.
- Full-size campaign: find your way through a huge apocalyptic fantasy environment, with 10+ levels to explore, including exterior and interior scenery.
- Horde mode: Survive through endless armies of foes and reach the top leaderboards.
- Customizable movement options, including locomotion(smooth movement) and teleport.
Undead Citadel due to release some time in 2019 on Steam (Vive, Rift, WMR), Oculus (Rift), and PlayStation (PSVR). Until then, you can follow the official website for more information.