Despite the fairly decent amount of news coming out in this week’s issue of Famitsu, the magazine is overall looking a little sad. With only 160 pages (an average issue easily breaks 250) and no reviews at all, it reflects the current state of both the local game biz and Japan in general — on cruise control, holding their breath, as they struggle to deal with the past month’s worth of national crises.
Something else in this week’s issue will make game fans sad, too: The release pages formally confirmed that Steambot Chronicles 2, sequel to the offbeat 2006 title that featured free-world exploration in steampunk-ish “trotmobiles,” has been cancelled. The sequel, first shown as a PlayStation 2 title at the 2006 Tokyo Game Show, was slated to come out in 2007 but wound up missing its release date and falling into the realm of vaporware. It was re-announced by developer Item in late 2008 as a PS3 title, but the company once again fell completely silent on the title, even as it produced and released the PSP spin-off game Steambot Chronicles Battle Tournament.
The news comes after Irem also cancelled the latest game in the Zettai Zetsumei Toshi series of disaster sims in the wake of the major earthquake and tsunami that struck Japan on March 11. The moves leave Irem with nearly no games to release, but the company itself — which makes the majority of its income developing software for pachinko and other gaming machines — is likely not in danger of going out of business.
