PlayStation.Blog » capybara

Might and Magic: Clash of Heroes Hits PSN Today, New Story Trailer

Alex Monney — Tue, 12 Apr 2011 22:05:28 +0000

As Mr. Nathan Vella mentioned last week, Ubisoft and Cabybara Games are set to cast Might and Magic: Clash of Heroes out into the wild later today. Announced last year, Clash of Heroes is an HD remake of the classic DS title released in 2009. If you’ve seen what Capybara Games has done with their previous HD-ifying ventures, you’ll know that the remake for Might and Magic: Clash of Heroes will blow your mind. As someone who never got his hands on the DS game, I was very impressed with my hands-on time with the game (or impressed enough to accidentally skip a meal on Sunday because I was too busy playing :P).

Even better is the story that unfolds throughout the game. Now, I don’t want to spoil things for anyone, but Clash of Heroes follows five heroes as they embark on a journey to retrieve a lost artifact. Through their adventures, you will visit five unique territories that will pose a variety of enemies and challenges. Take a look at our new trailer highlighting the five heroes above.

Couple all this with some stunning HD visuals and online/offline multiplayer modes (either 1v1 or 2v2) and you have a puzzle role-playing game that will surely keep you busy for quite some time. Look for Might and Magic: Clash of Heroes when it hits the PlayStation Network later today for $14.99. If our blog posts still haven’t convinced you, be sure to take the demo for a spin.

Might & Magic: Clash of Heroes Has Puzzles, Battles, Critter Crunch Connections

Nathan Vella — Mon, 04 Apr 2011 23:05:03 +0000

As you in-the-know PSN bloggers realize, Might & Magic: Clash of Heroes is our HD love letter to the original game that we released in 2009 to acclaim and awards. It’s not often that you get the chance to remake your own game, so we couldn’t pass up the opportunity to bring this gem to a whole new audience: you guys! By now most people know about Clash of Heroes’ engrossing campaign mode, its innovative puzzle-strategy gameplay, and its tense turn-based battles. But what few realize is that those battles are even better when your facing off against your friends (or some random stranger who has an ass-whupping coming to him). So that’s why Might & Magic Clash of Heroes is dropping with full local and online multiplayer, in either 1v1 or 2v2 flavours. Not content to simply juice up the multiplayer mode and port the game over, we decided to redo the game from scratch with all new 2D HD art, hand-drawn by the same talented crew of artists that brought you the lush visuals of Critter Crunch. Puuuurtyyy!

Now you’re up to speed on why Clash is jumping from handheld to console, but what’s it actually about? There’s two core components to Might & Magic Clash of Heroes: Battles and Adventure. Let’s take a bit of time to dive into each one. And what better way to do this than through a special video made just for PlayStation.Blog readers…

Battle gameplay is the heart and soul of the Clash of Heroes experience, combining turn-based strategy and puzzle gaming. In Clash of Heroes, you can grab units from the end of each column, and place them at the back of any new column – just like how you moved critters around with Biggs’ tongue in Critter Crunch! Go on the offensive by matching three of the same units vertically, or build defensive walls by matching three (or more) of the same units horizontally. That’s the meat of the battle system, but trust me, there’s tons of gravy. Rarer and more powerful units get added to the mix, bringing with them special attacks and abilities. Also in your magical toolbox of magic are Hero Spells, your hero’s special attacks that have different attributes, and when triggered at strategic times, can turn the tide of a battle.

Clash of Heroes may have puzzle roots, but players will need to start thinking ahead, watching their opponents, and formulating a strategy if they hope to stay alive on the battlefield–all while keeping their puzzle-y eyes sharpened for potential combos!

Battle may be the guts of Clash of Heroes, but it’s got some mean adventuring as well.

Clash of Heroes takes place across the varied lands of Ashan, and over the course of five campaigns, you’ll take five distinct young characters and mold them into heroes through the heat of battle. Lots of battles! While adventuring, you’ll meet tons of kooky characters, find chests full of loot and wind up facing off against enemies of all kinds, leveling up your hero in the process. You can power through the game’s main quests, or choose to stop along the way to take optional side-quests, or make some extra coin bounty hunting, or even solve some Critter Crunch-style puzzle-mode battles!

Well, that’s enough blabbering for one post. In case you can’t tell, we at Capy are ultra-excited to unleash Clash of Heroes, and hopefully we’ll be back again soon to continue yelling at you over the internet about how proud we are of the game.

See you April 12th folks!

Coming to PSN: Might & Magic: Clash of Heroes for PS3

Nathan Vella — Thu, 03 Jun 2010 17:31:50 +0000

Ahoy-hoy PlayStation.Blog readers! Nathan Vella here — I’m co-founder and president of Capybara. You might remember Capy from such PlayStation Network titles as the barftastic puzzle romp, Critter Crunch! Capy is back on the PlayStation.Blog after a short hiatus to talk about our return to PSN — this time we’ve teamed up with our pals at Ubisoft to bring you Might & Magic: Clash of Heroes.

Now, some of you might be thinking, “what the hell is this game?” Well, imagine for a moment that the lovely Mrs. Puzzle and dashing Mr. Turn-Based Strategy got together and made a baby — that baby would be the battle system. Now, take that baby and raise it up on RPG adventuring, and you’ve got Might & Magic Clash of Heroes, a puzzle/strategy/RPG hybrid in 2D HD!

Now, when Clash of Heroes was first published last year, it was showered in critical love and received numerous glorious awards giving Capy lots of reasons to celebrate. And, to celebrate we have taken all the awesomeness of the original, and ratcheting it up to 1000. Now we’re back on the awesome PlayStation Network with online & local versus multiplayer, a new co-op multiplayer mode, tons of balancing tweaks, new unit abilities and so much more.

Also, we’ve taken our love of both high-definition 2D & traditional animation, and combined them to create the stunning visuals of Clash of Heroes. Critter Crunch artists Qiqo & Sylvain have joined forces with the rest of Capy’s amazing art team to bring you thousands of frames of 2D HD goodness. Capy believes that 2D gaming has a bright future ahead of it in the HD era, and we’re proud to be a part of a small group (alongside upcoming PSN awesomeness like Klei’s Shank) trying to push 2D HD as far as it can go.

I’ve included some screenshots in this post but, in September, you will be able to see the game in action on your PS3! As well, Clash of Heroes will be playable in the Ubisoft booth at this year’s E3, so definitely stay tuned for more news on this game.

Since you’re already online, you can hop over to the Might & Magic Facebook page and hit that trusty LIKE button. And while we’re talking “SOCIAL NETWORKING WEB 6.O DOT COM/INTERNETS”, you can follow Might & Magic Community girl Noemie on Twitter via @UbiXhane, as well as keep up to date with Capy via @Capybara_Games.

Just like the last time we were here, Capy will be answering as many questions as humanly possible. Ask away friends!

Critter Crunch Out Today on PSN! OM NOM NOM NOM!

Kris Piotrowski — Thu, 08 Oct 2009 18:20:15 +0000

Hello friends!

This is it! Today is the day! Critter Crunch is out in North America! So this afternoon, turn on your PlayStation 3, log on to the PlayStation Store, and download it! It’s only $6.99!

Until then, check out our launch trailer entitled “A Barf In The Night”:

For those of you unfamiliar with Capy’s hand-animated 60 frames-per-second arcade-puzzle extravaganza, here’s a quick recap:

Crazy Single Player Modes: Adventure, Puzzle, Challenge and Survival
Crazy Multiplayer Modes: Versus and Co-Op (offline and online via the Playstation Network)
Crazy Trophies!
Barf!

And just in case you missed the first batch of reviews, here are a couple of handy links to help you get up to speed with the word on the street:

Destructoid says:

“With Critter Crunch, Capybara has designed one of the most original and endearing titles the puzzle genre has seen in years…With solid gameplay mechanics and the iconic character designs of Biggs and company, it’s a game that belongs in any puzzle fan’s digital library.”

IGN says:

“It sets a new standard for graphics in the genre and is simply one of the best looking games on PSN. Luckily, it also has the gameplay to back up the looks. No puzzle fan should miss this. Even if you don’t consider yourself a fan of the genre, you’ll likely find Biggs’ charm hard to resist.”

And for those of you that just ADORE rainbow-colored spew, here’s another trailer just for kicks:

Yikes! That’s a whole lot of Critter Crunch up in this post. Go forth, Critter Crunch fans, and multiply.

See you online!

-Kris

Critter Crunch Hits PSN October 8 for $6.99!

Kris Piotrowski — Wed, 23 Sep 2009 22:01:30 +0000

Hello Blog friends,

Kris from Capy here, signing in just to drop a quick little announcement bomb on all y’all brains:

Just in case you didn’t actually watch on the video above, here’s what you missed:

CRITTER CRUNCH IS COMING TO A NORTH AMERICAN PLAYSTATION 3 NEAR YOU ON OCTOBER 8TH, AKA “THE DAY OF THE CRUNCH” AKA “CRITTER HOUR” AKA “BIGGS’ BIG BBQ BASH.”

And it’s $6.99. SIX DOLLARS AND NINETY-NINE CENTS.

Why? Because we love you, and because we care. And it let us do that animated switcharoo-thing with the “9″ transforming into the “6″ after Biggs peels the price, which we think worked out really well.

Anyway, let me break it down for you in equation form:

(Biggs + Smalls + Critter Crunch) x (October 8th (You – 6.99)) = AWESOME FUN PUZZLE PARTY.

Stay tuned for lots more info on the PlayStation Blog and on www.crittercrunch.com as we approach October 8th.

-Kris

PlayStation Eye Chat: Critter Crunch for PSN

Chris Morell — Wed, 05 Aug 2009 18:56:19 +0000

When you last saw Critter Crunch, it was probably at E3 when Capybara‘s Nathan Vella walked us through the game’s basics on the show floor.

Well Nathan is back, along with fellow Capy compadre Kris Piotrowski, to talk much more in-depth about Critter Crunch. Specifically, the duo describes the puzzle game’s versus /co-op modes and their power-ups, how the foodchain mechanic works and the robust single-player adventure more. Plus, there’s nice chunk of in-game footage included in the video.

And yes, there’s plenty more barf, too. Strategic, rainbow-colored barf, if you will.

E3 09 On the Show Floor: Critter Crunch

Chris Morell — Fri, 05 Jun 2009 01:01:46 +0000

You saw Critter Crunch in a post a few weeks back, marking the historic debut of technicolor barf to PSN. So we tracked down cofounder and President of Capy, Nathan Vella, at E3 2009. Here, Nathan talks us through Critter Crunch and how it plays, going in-depth with competitive and co-op multiplayer modes and more. Everyone who played it on the show floor seemed to enjoy it, and we’re stoked to show off more of Critter Crunch in the near future, with Nathan promising to bring it back to the Blog very soon.

Critter Crunch! PlayStation Network! Barf!

Kris Piotrowski — Tue, 12 May 2009 17:33:51 +0000

Hello, new best friends!

This is Kris. I’m the creative director at Capy, which means I’m by-far the coolest guy at the studio. And Capy is pretty cool, so that’s not just talk. Anyway, who is Capy, right? Well, Capy is an indie studio from the sometimes frozen, other times disgustingly humid Canadian wonderland known as Toronto.

So, um, check this trailer…but only if you’re down with technicolor barf!

Boing! That was me announcing Critter Crunch for PlayStation Network!

Everyone at Capy has been working super-hard creating this crazy little arcade-puzzler (and filling it with humongous doses of love) so we’re very excited to finally announce its existence. Critter Crunch is fueled by an original and award-winning “food chain” puzzle mechanic, which is all about feeding critters into each other until they burst. It’s exactly as cute as it is horrible and sad, just like nature itself!

The game features a bunch of single player modes like adventure & puzzle, as well as online and local multiplayer in versus & co-op flavors, with a plethora of fancy trophies to collect. It also has lots of really pretty 1080p art that should make your HDTV happy.

I hope you like it!

If you have any questions, fire away in the comments below and I’ll do my best to answer them…and check back for more PlayStation.Blog updates soon!

-Kris