Cast of the Seven Godsends Redux promises old-school arcade fun on 20th July

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Cast of the Seven Godsends Redux promises old-school arcade fun on 20th July

Designer Paolo Cattaneo’s homage to the classic coin-op games of his youth

Hello there, I’m Paolo Cattaneo, the coder and main designer behind Cast of the Seven Godsends – Redux, my homage to the classic run ‘n’ gun arcade games of the ’90s, my first-love in the world of video games.

It all began in the summer of 1990. The eyes of the world were fixed on my home country, Italy, as it hosted the FIFA World Cup (that’s soccer if you’re reading this in the U.S.). However, while football fever gripped the world, my attention lay elsewhere. As a 13 year-old my first love was, and still is, video games.

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During the summer I used to spend my time investigating beach resorts, searching for the very latest arcade machines. I reveled in the delights of Double Dragon, Bubble Bobble, Shinobi and Pocket Gal. These video games were new, exciting and grabbed my complete attention.

Those breezy summer days were such unforgettable times. I was learning how to beat a game. Chatter amongst my fellow arcade-game aficionados was intense. Sometimes I picked up great tips, other times there were just outright lies – “I grabbed the machine gun from Double Dragon’s final boss!” was a common one. Occasionally a pro gamer would show up to put a coin in Shinobi; all the kids in the resort would flock to witness a master playing the game, hoping to see what boss was lying in wait in the final mission.

Every August, my family holiday would lead me to the mountains. Usually it was boring, but one sunny afternoon I slipped into a cafe and in the corner I spotted an old friend. There in front of me was the knight from the game Ghosts ‘n’ Goblins but something was different. There were much better graphics and was that new golden armour? Yeah, it was Ghouls ‘n’ Ghosts, the second Capcom game in the saga and the second game running on CPS (just for the record).

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Like many of you, I was blown away by that game. I was also lucky to find a guy playing the game who had some good skills. His master-class allowed me to witness the whole game the very first time I set eyes on it.

As soon as we got home from the holiday I started to draw levels and storyboards in my schoolbooks. In the ensuing years I developed my idea for a Ghosts ‘n’ Goblins-style game and attempted to code it myself.

Finally, in 2010 I met Vincenzo. We teamed up together and started to work on Cast of the Seven Godsends. At first we worked on the game during our spare time. Progress was slow so we decided to work on it full-time with an aim of finishing the game within a year.

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I tried to put so many references from my experiences as a young 13 year-old player into the game. If you spent a good part of your childhood playing videogames you’ll discover them easily.

For instance, can you spot what Cast of the Seven Godsends has in common with Konami’s Trigon (aka Lighting Fighters)? I’ll let you discover for yourself. Oh, and level 2 of the game was inspired by that mountain town we went on holiday to. So, if you love old-school style games and grew up playing on 8 or 16-bit machines, we’ve got a connection.

Vincenzo is 10 years younger than me, and he didn’t grow up playing classic arcade games. He was far more focused on hi-res graphics and shaders. Together our respective points of view work well and we have created a game which provides the old school mechanics but presented in style that harks back to the 16-bit era but with a modern feel – increased resolution, addition of particles, lights, shaders and so on.

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