I was searching through our post archive and our tag database before starting this article looking for anything I could backlink to.  Specifically, I was looking for anything that mentioned Ikaruga.  Surprisingly, I found no previous mention of Ikaruga on our site whatsoever, which is a damn shame, as Ikaruga is a truly wonderful game.  Ikaruga!  I did manage to find a small mention for the XBLA Summer of Arcade game, Limbo, however, so at least there’s that.  Now, you may be asking me out loud, even though I can’t hear you (which would mean you’re pretty much talking to yourself, you crazy, crazy person), “Chris, dude, what the hell is your point?”.  Well, the point is Outland.

Announced today at PAX, Outland, from Ubisoft, is a side-scrolling platformer.  This on its own, without the rest of it, is enough to make me happy (I love side-scrolling platformers).  ”If you’re going to be talking about Outland, why the crap did you mention Ikaruga and Limbo?!”  Well, Outland uses a Light/Dark system almost identical to the one found in Ikaruga, and the silhouette graphics are visually evocative of Limbo, though the lines are sharper and the background and character colors are, well, existent, and vibrant.

So let’s do a quick re-cap.  Outland, which visually reminds me of a sharper, more colorful Limbo, will be a side-scrolling platformer that uses Ikaruga’s light/dark system.  If you haven’t played Ikaruga (philistine), the light/dark system works like this: There are light based enemies that use light based weapons, and there are dark based enemies that use dark based weapons.  When you are in light mode, you can not be harmed by light enemies, and when you are in dark mode, you can not be harmed by dark enemies.  On the other hand, while you are in light mode, you can not harm light enemies, and while in dark mode, you can not harm dark enemies.  The trick is in switching modes for defensive and offensive purposes as smoothly as possible.  In Ikaruga, there would be a mixed swarm of light and dark enemies, requiring seamless mode-switching to prevent damage and to harm your enemies.  I imagine the same element will appear in Outland.

Unfortunately, Outland is not due out until next year, so I can’t make sweet, sweet gamer love to it quite yet.

-[insert SWEET, SWEET GAMER LOVE here]

Images sourced from IGN.