Back in 2008, Alien Hominid creator The Behemoth rolled out – as part of the Xbox Live Summer of Arcade event – what would become one of the best side-scrolling, 2-D beat’em up games of its generation, Castle Crashers. A remastered edition eventually made its way to the Xbox One and Steam in 2015, but the team then moved on to other projects. However, in a surprising move, The Behemoth announced today that Castle Crashers Remastered will be making a return to consoles, except this time for the PS4 and the Nintendo Switch.
The 4-player multiplayer title exemplified the best of co-operative play and casual fun, mixing in stylish and cartoonish graphics, chaotic battles, and unique character designs in one accessible package. Castle Crashers became an instant hit and was one of the most well-received indie games of the Xbox 360 generation, going on to release a PS3 and PC port in 2010 and 2012, respectively.
The main game consisted of four knights embarking on a quest to save four princesses from an evil wizard, a common fantasy trope in entertainment dialed up to 11 with a huge variety of enemies, level design, and bosses to conquer. Replay value was never a weakness either, as the game allowed the campaign to be revisited with what seemed like every in-game character, enemies and allies included. The ability to unlock this colorful cast of playable characters, mix and match different team compositions, and head right back into the fray translated to long hours invested into this rather simple game.
For those that missed out on the 2015 remastered edition, the improvements include a brand-new mini-game, much better texture size, all previously released DLCs and bonus content, 60 frames per second graphics, and “various performance updates and improvements to gameplay and multiplayer.”
In the announcement blog post, The Behemoth also addressed the fan demand for a sequel. The team suggests it might happen someday, but for now they want to focus on gaining experience so any potential sequel would be an improved product. The developers are currently at work on a project appropriately named “Game 5”.
As for why the sudden release for the two platforms, the indie developers expressed that they wished to maintain the lifespan of their titles, and what better way than to take advantage of the hardware improvements of the newer generation. Nintendo’s platform for them has always been tricky in the past to develop for, but with the Nintendo Switch, as with many other developers, The Behemoth feels it is “perfect for [them] to make [their] return on and it brings with it the ability to have [their] games be portable.”
Castle Crashers Remastered makes its triumphant return on the Nintendo Switch and PS4 sometime during Summer 2019.