Fighting with the strength of many men, The Black Knight must battle through a dark and unusual fairy tale world to rid it of an unexpected evil.

Black Knight Sword is an unusual game for unusual gamers. The idea is to send ourselves back to the 90’s, lock the door, forget the outer world and enjoy the pure gameplay. This traditional side-scrolling action game will provide us with uncountable trials, failures and the joy of beating the unbeatable. It is not hard to lay back on the couch and get lost in the world of the Black Knight. Suda51 and Grasshopper Manufacture did a lot with the look and feel of the game. If you still want more, turn up the speakers and be enchanted by Akira Yamaoka’s composing and sound design.

Not many contemporary titles have such a unique world like Black Knight Sword. We are sitting in a theatre and living the fairy tale of the Black Knight, fighting his battles, suffering from his wounds… and surely rejoicing in his victory. Wherever we are, whatever we face, we’ll repeatedly ask one question: “What the hell was that supposed to be?” We may find our own answers, but this audiovisual experience will be burned into our minds forever. Everything looks and sounds shocking and confusing, but if we climb up onto the top of this mountain built of the game’s uniquely crafted elements, we will see the entire horizon: a matchless world that gives us an inimitable experience.

Not only is the ‘look and feel’ twisted — the storyline blows it away. In the first scene we find ourselves (our beloved Black Knight) hanging on a rope. When we get back on the ground we become possessed by Black Hellebore, the Sword Spirit. The entire story is a messed up fairy tale from this point on. As any worthwhile knight would, we set off to find the Princess, but the purpose is elimination rather than rescue. I won’t start to analyze the story in depth or try to define the hook of the game. We will all find them out; the game speaks to each every one of us in our own language. We can’t resist, Suda51 will most certainly pick us up and drop us in the middle of the tale on the stage.

Prepare your tickets, take your seats and enjoy the show.

Sine Mora is launching on PS3 and PS Vita today, including some content that was cut from other versions of the game. Between a new challenge mode, the collaboration of a Japanese shoot’em up giant, and the special abilities of the PS Vita hardware, we truly think the wait for Sine Mora on PS3 and PS Vita was worth it – these versions are the richest we could possibly deliver.

From a technical perspective, the PS3 version was a walk in the park. Our technology has always been designed with the Cell processor in mind, enabling us to go for high framerates and image quality, uncompromised. We’re especially proud of how the PS Vita version turned out — neither the framerate nor the resolution was sacrificed, delivering the highest possible rendition of our original vision on a handheld.

Having exclusive levels is cool, but a brand new game mode is even better. We wanted to include something memorable — a game mode which is more difficult than other parts of the game on insane difficulty setting. A mode that is so tricky, even its creators couldn’t master it on their first attempt. Nor the tenth.

Don’t worry if you won’t initially succeed. During the development process, we identified five distinct skills the players have to acquire to master the game: evasion, aim, time management, weapon handling and using time capsules. Each challenge tests one of these skills, except the final one, which requires all of them. And yes, beating this mode unlocks a Trophy, so no matter how hard it is, you’re going to try and complete it, aren’t you?

We sorted out approximately 50 beautiful pieces of art from renowned Grasshopper Manufacture artists and anime legend Mr. Maeda Mahiro (Kill Bill Vol. 1, Animatrix – The Second Renaissance) for you to compare them with the end results. These pieces are all original concept artwork of the game’s scenes, characters and bosses. The catch is, we want you to make some effort to unlock them all – the more you travel with your PS Vita, the more concept art you get. If you visit Grashopper’s studio in Tokyo, you’ll get them all.

…Just kidding about that last part.

During the first cycle of development, the Sine Mora team reviewed dozens of shoot’em up games from the last two decades. Many of these became instant favorites, especially the ones from G.rev. We’ve tried to find a way to show how much we respect their work, and during the last weeks of the development, Theodore Reiker (the project’s director) was able to negotiate a deal with them — we got to include Wilhelmine Muller, a heroine of G.rev’s Under Defeat as a token of our appreciation. Her special sub-weapon, the UD Bomb, will wipe off the screen faster than any other armament.

Sine Mora has been an incredibly long venture, from the earliest visions seven years ago until the ultimate PS3 and PS Vita versions we’re proudly presenting to you now. PlayStation gamers had to wait the longest, but we hope you will be satisfied with the results.

Skydrift combines the speed and intensity of air racing with the action of vehicular combat, and it just hit PSN! Give it a shot – we think it’s a unique, exciting racing title. In Skydrift, your task is simple: beat your opponents at all costs. You can outmaneuver them on the course, or try to get the upper hand by deploying one of six different power-ups, from missiles and aerial mines to turbo boosts and repair kits. Your opponents will also be gunning for you and trying to take you down by any means necessary, so stay on your toes.

When developing the tracks for the game, we wanted to create courses that would be both visually compelling and offer players unique challenges. The exotic locations in Skydrift include a tropical paradise, a frozen glacial setting, and a sprawling mine area. You can even race some of these tracks in a backward variant for an extra shot of variety. Skydrift also offers up eight different planes, each one controlling differently and catering to a different play style than the others. There are also 32 different skins that players can use to customize their plane, personalizing the experience even more.

One of the things that we hope people notice about Skydrift is the striking graphics engine. We created Skydrift using an all-new graphics engine. Utilizing a smooth framerate, detailed textures, and special lighting effects and motion blur techniques, Skydrift is a great-looking game that rivals and even bests some retail games.

We built Skydrift to be a fun, pick-up-and-play experience, and we really feel that we accomplished this goal. Skydrift moves fast and plays smoothly, with tight controls and a great graphics engine that rivals a full-blown retail console experience. We’re really proud of what we were able to achieve and can’t wait to finally get the game in your hands. Skydrift will be available for download on the PlayStation Store – give it a shot and let us know what you think!