Vanquish (video game)



Vanquish is an upcoming video game in development by Platinum Games for the PlayStation 3 and Xbox 360. It is Shinji Mikami's first game under the Platinum Games brand. The game has been in development since 2007; in January 2010, a full motion video trailer was released. The game is being published by Sega. Atsushi Inaba is producing the game. Mikami has stated that the game is being developed with the PlayStation 3 as its lead platform, commenting that it was a "great success."

Plot
Vanquish takes place in the near future where the planet's human population has exploded so rapidly that nations of people around the globe are fighting for the scarce available resources. The United States of America has attempted to alleviate its own energy problems by launching a space station harboring a solar energy-driven generator to provide them with an alternative source of fuel from the sun. However, the government of the Russian Federation on Earth has been overthrown in a coup d'état by ultra-nationalist forces calling themselves the Order of the Red Star.

Russian forces capture this space station and divert its harvested solar energy into a blast wave that destroys San Francisco, aiming to force the US into a total and unconditional surrender. The main antagonist, known as Victor Zaitsev, demands that the American government surrender or he will choose New York City as his next target.

The President of America, Elizabeth Winters, refuses to back down in the face of such a threat. Instead, she takes Lieutenant-Colonel Robert Burns, a decorated war veteran, and puts him in charge of a newly-commissioned task force called Bravo Company. This team consists of several space-faring special forces, veteran Marines, and the remnants of the defending US forces still alive on board the space station. On top of that, she also gives them the game's protagonist and playable character, Sam Gideon (voiced by Gideon Emery in the English version.)

Sam is a Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) researcher equipped with an Augmented Reaction Suit (ARS), a cutting-edge mechanical suit outfitted with a vast array of functions, including jet boosters attached to both arms and legs. He is armed with an experimental weapon system called BLADE, which is capable of scanning any existing weapon and then transforming into a perfect replica of that weapon. Its ability to store three scans at a time means that at any given time the BLADE can shapeshift between three completely different guns.

On the surface, this mission gives DARPA the perfect chance to test out the new ARS on the Russians. But both the President and the Secretary of Defense give Sam classified orders to rescue a scientist named Dr. Francis Candide, who was working on-site when the station was attacked. The Doctor has decided to take matters into his own hands and is trying to disable the array himself before it can be used to destroy another city.

Development
In the course of developing Vanquish, Shinji Mikami said that Vanquish's graphics were inspired by the Casshern anime series.