Suda 51 and Swery Attempting to Team Up for HOTEL BARCELONA
Now here’s some clickbait if I’ve ever seen it. Turns out that duo auteur Japanese game devs Suda 51 (No More Heroes, Killer 7) and Swery (Deadly Premonition, D4: Dark Dreams Don’t Die) are working on a game together! And auteur indie label Devolver Digital is publishing it! Praise the Sun! Titled Hotel Barcelona, the game might take place in a hotel in Barcelona. Or maybe not a hotel. Or maybe a hotel, but not one in Barcelona. It also may or may not have ghosts or killers, and be about people that work in a place. Who knows! Announced at the IGN Japan Live Stream, Hotel Barcelona is reportedly inspired by Twin Peaks and Siren and will be made with just a $1 million budget. The genre is “side-scrolling,” and it will be coming to your, “accessible device.” You can watch the entire stream above, some of which is translated to English. Even though 90% of the stream is in Japanese, I highly recommend you watch it. It’s a case study in a translator slowly losing his mind. I cannot imagine trying to take what comes out of Suda 51/Swery, then having to double translate it from crazy to sensible then Japanese to English, all live on stream. That translator is the real Travis Touchdown.
I’d go on with more details about Hotel Barcelona, but it’s all insanely uncertain and vague. More importantly, in a weird plot twist that’s worthy of a Suda 51/Swery game, it might not even exist. Soon after the news was reported, Devolver Digital tweeted about the project:
it’s a funny thing for Devolver to say, since it was stated on stream that they had already committed $1 million to the project. Kind of a weird thing to overlook. It’s unclear at this point if they have already had some talks and simply not come to any official agreement, or if they actually just got drunk and imagined the whole thing. Seriously. One of the things they said on stream is that they frequently brainstorm hammered and forget what they had decided on. The whole event was kind of a drunk brainstorming event, as is amply apparent if you watch at least 30 seconds of it.
Regardless, I fucking love the idea. We need to give more madmen $1 million and limitless alcohol and just see what happens. If Hotel Barcelona happens, I will buy that shit day 1. How about you guys? You want to see madness incarnate on your “accessible devices?” Let me know below!
