Stuff your vote in the ballot box and decide on your favorite zoo animal, because it's time to get political with a new Hail to the Chimp demo that just released to the Xbox Live Marketplace. The demo, which is only available to U.S. and Canadian Live subscribers, features "presidential party game" style shenanigans and enough animal-based jokes to last you a few years. Download if you're interested, ignore this post if you're not ... but we really didn't have to tell you that did we?
*Sigh* More delays. This time it's Hail to the Chimp, the arena-fighting, politically-charged, animal-filled cel-shaded game from Wideload studios. Originally set for release at the end of this month, Hail to the Chimp has been delayed a month for "polish." As former QA experience tells us, this is likely a good thing, as there was probably a choice between hitting ship with a certain amount of bugs or delaying the game and getting to fix the bugs. When it does finally hit on June 24th, Hail to the Chimp should hopefully be that much better.
Wideload, the kooky cats behind Hail to the Chimp, the satirical fighter set in the animal kingdom, has announced the formation of its Shorts division. The Shorts division will focus (surprisingly) on downloadable games for various console services and PC. As you might suspect, Wideload Shorts has plans to create games for Xbox Live Arcade. Wideload is careful not to call such games "casual," as they wish to make it clear that while gameplay will be kept simple, it should still be compelling to longtime gamers as well as newcomers. While no specific titles have been named, the first Wideload Shorts game is expected to arrive in late 2007.
If there's one thing we can say with absolute certainty, it's that the Xbox 360 is desperately short on games in the animals-fighting-for-political-power genre. Thank goodness for Gamecock and Wideload (of Stubbs the Zombie fame) and their upcoming title, Hail to the Chimp. 1UP recently scored a sneak peek at the game. Here's the story: the lion has been ousted, and now all the animals are competing to become the new king of the jungle. Thus, politics factor into the game, though the gameplay itself revolves around paw-to-paw combat. The game is laced with subtle satirical humor. For instance, clams play a big part in the game, though we're talking about actual clams here. Several of the gametypes award victory to the "candidate" with the most clams. We'll let you puzzle that one out for yourselves.
Wideload hopes the game will be available in time for the U.S. elections in 2008.