Fans of classic dead franchises rejoice! Wild Arms, Shadow Hearts, AND Breath of Fire are getting spiritual successors on Kickstarter. If you’ve been waiting for the official creators and license holders for IPs like these to do something, you’ll have to keep waiting. In the meantime, new creators (and old creators, in some instances) have utilized Kickstarter to fire up new games inspired by the legends of the past.
And these games are the past, make no mistake.
Wild Arms’ last “real game” was Wild Arms XF for PlayStation Portable, released back in 2006. The series had a now-defunct mobile game called Wild Arms: Million Memories from 2018, or in other words, it’s already been through its death throes.
Likewise, Shadow Hearts: From the New World closed out its respective series way back on the PlayStation 2. It numbers only four games in total but it had the dignity to not throw its pearls before swine on the mobile app market.
Thirdly, Capcom’s classic RPG series, Breath of Fire, also experienced a slow demise. The first four entries, maybe including the original game, are widely celebrated but Dragon Quarter for PS2 has had a mixed reception at best and you’d be hard-pressed to find anyone who played Breath of Fire 6. Resembling Wild Arms in its latter years, Breath of Fire’s swansong was a mobile and PC game only released in Japan that has long been shut down.
Now the memories of these icons can be laid peacefully to rest, thanks to Armed Fantasia: To the End of the Wilderness, Penny Blood, and Tears of Magic.
The first two games were announced by Wild Bunch Productions and Yukikaze, both founded by the core teams involved with Wild Arms and Shadow Hearts. Their double Kickstarter was fully funded within 24 hours. That should come as no surprise considering the fanbases for these games have been clamoring for new entries for years.
Tears of Magic comes to us courtesy of Good Old Pixel and the project will involve composer Yoshino Aoki who worked on Breath of Fire III and Breath of Fire IV. At the time of this writing, the Kickstarter for Tears of Magic has yet to launch but let me assure you, this is one I don’t intend to miss.
If my statement above about fans clamoring seemed at all dismissive, I can admit that I have done my fair share of fan clamoring for a new Breath of Fire. I can’t express my excitement seeing characters resembling cat people, dragon whelps, Bleu/Deis, and FISHING!
It’s delightful to hear about these spiritual successors on Kickstarter. In addition to Sea of Stars, retro gamers now have a slew of new games inspired by old games to keep an eye out for.
Red formerly ran The Well-Red Mage and now serves The Pixels as founder, writer, editor, and podcaster. He has undertaken a seemingly endless crusade to talk about the games themselves in the midst of a culture obsessed with the latest controversy, scandal, and news cycle about harassment, toxicity, and negativity. Pick out his feathered cap on Twitter @thewellredmage or Mage Cast.
