Battle Chasers Game Announcement: Why It’s a Letdown

The creators of the Darksiders video game franchise recently announced the start of a new game project (via Polygon). Unfortunately, that project is not a long-awaited sequel to Darksiders 2. Vigil Games co-founders Joe “Mad” Madureira and Ryan Stefanalli formed a new studio called Airship Syndicate. The new game project for the studio is based on Joe Mad’s currently defunct comic book series, Battle Chasers. It is part of Mad’s upcoming to revive the property, which has not had a new issue published for well over a decade in 2001.

Color me a little disappointed. When I first heard talk about Airship Syndicate and the company’s new project, I hoped the former staff members of Vigil Games were getting together to finish the Darksiders franchise. I realize that Nordic Games currently owns the Darksiders property, but my hope was that some sort of deal was made so Nordic Games hired the team members who had a hand in the series to make the new game. Unfortunately, the Darksiders franchise remains in limbo after the second game. That is a significant blow to fans of the franchise–especially after the way in which the first and second games ended.

I really have nothing against Battle Chasers. I took a look at the comic way back when. It contained some fun designs and concepts. However, it was hard to get invested in a series that experienced such a spotty release schedule. Not to mention, Joe Mad essentially abandoned the series after nine issues to pursue a career in video games. As a result, it was hard to get invested in the world of Battle Chasers, its stories and characters. The property has not really been relevant in almost two decades. I am not sure if the interest for a new Battle Chasers game will be viable.

That said, the developers discussed that the game will have a similar sense of adventure to Darksiders, but it will be “mechanically different.” If they can produce some similar results, I will definitely give the new Battle Chasers video game a look. I really enjoyed how Battle Chasers incorporated a style of hack-and-clash action-adventure video games with dungeon crawler role-playing games. Plus, the game is supposed to have a variety of the Battle Chasers characters as playable characters. If Airship Syndicate can pull that off, at least the title could be fun. I have always enjoyed the unique dynamic presentation of the characters in the comic.

However, I am also skeptical that the game will ultimately meet its release. The Polygon report basically said the project does not yet have funding. So basically, it is all conceptual. In fact, Airship Syndicate might have to fund the title completely through Kickstarter. At the moment, I am not sure if the fan support is there for a new video game based on a defunct comic property that has not had a new issue in over 10 years. I am also not sure if a major publisher would pick up the project for funding, but that remains to be seen. Either way, it seems like the game is far away from an actual release.