News
2D Action-RPG ‘Dark Devotion’ Takes Inspiration From ‘Dark Souls’, Lovecraft and ‘Castlevania’
Admittedly, when the email came in for Hibernian Workshop’s Dark Devotion, and the first words I saw were “the ‘Dark Souls of 2D Dark Souls‘”, I was skeptical. But, after checking out the first developer diary for the game, I have to say that this action RPG has more to it than just being hard.
Set for release Q1 2019 on Steam, Dark Devotion puts you in the role of a Templar assigned to explore a mysterious fallen temple for your faith. That’s of course an excuse for you to traverse four worlds of richly-detailed and animated 2D sprites, and beat up on enemies in epic battles of fast reflexes and intuition.
Anyways, the dev diary has three members of the team explaining the artists, locations and classic gaming inspirations that inspire Dark Devotion. This includes horror fare such as HP Lovecraft and Castlevania, the former of which ties into the character development with the game’s ‘anti-hero’ protagonist. It has me curious about the game!
In the grim darkness of the far future there is only war, but it was a cheerful illustrator from England who helped to define the terrifying war-torn imagery that inspired what we now know as Grimdark (a hybrid genre combining horror with sci-fi/fantasy).
Unfortunately for fans of Warhammer 40,000, Trench Crusade and countless other sources of Grimdark thrills, veteran artist John Blanche passed away this week after struggling with health issues for the past few years.
While the artist retired back in 2023, he leaves us with an enormous legacy of iconic artwork that continues to inspire gamers and storytellers around the world to this very day.
The news is especially gloomy as it was only last year that Daniel Lowman and Napoleon Dynamite himself Jon Heder released The Grim & the Dark: The Search for John Blanche, a documentary following Heder’s exploration of the Grimdark genre culminating in a heartwarming encounter with Blanche in his own home.
Below is one of my favorite pieces by Blanche, his highly influential depiction of Warhammer 40k’s God-Emperor of Mankind on his Golden Throne.
We send our deepest condolences to John Blanche’s family, friends, and fans.
You must be logged in to post a comment.