After three years in development, Dark Souls II releases this Tuesday on March 11th for Xbox 360 and PlayStation 3, but nothing has been announced for PlayStation 4 and Xbox One, which is odd for an adored AAA franchise. It’s common for publishers to release on PC alongside console versions, but that’s not the case with Dark Souls II, which releases on PC on April 25th.
Though the game features a new game engine that produces better graphics and lighting, and most importantly is scalable to what developers need, I keep asking myself is this the best version we’re going to see on consoles, or is more news awaiting?
During a launch event for Dark Souls II, Takeshi Miyazoe, global producer for Namco Bandai, responded to my concern:
Programmers always design for new technology to always keep up and be ahead. It wasn’t necessary for next-generation consoles as for the reason behind developing a new engine, but [we still considered] the next generation of gaming on PC or on consoles. From Software wanted to make sure that they were prepared for what might come out, not Dark Souls II specifically, but for any games they’re continuing to develop.
Time will tell if Dark Souls II will make its way to PlayStation 4 and Xbox One, but a loyal audience will be waiting if it decides to arrive. The original Dark Souls was ported over to PC after 90 thousand people signed a petition drawing Namco Bandai attention. Could we see a similar case for Dark Souls II?
