Goichi Suda (aka Suda51) was caught on the mic and the interview gave us a lot of background information about the new version of Shadows of the Damned.

The Shadows of the Damned remaster has been in talks with Electronic Arts for 7-8 years. Back then they owned the IP rights and the publisher insisted on releasing it on Origin (now called EA App). After they were acquired by a Chinese company, NetEase, they renegotiated with the publisher and this time Origin was no longer a requirement so they could move forward with the project. They didn’t know about the Lollipop Chainsaw RePOP, so he was surprised to hear the news. Shadows of the Damned was created in collaboration with Shinji Mikami (Resident Evil!) and Electronic Arts, with a lot of passion and hard work, full of conflict, but from that came the chemistry in creating the characters (e.g. Paula) to make it truly Grasshopper Manufacture style.

The setting for Shadows of the Damned was originally inspired by a small Czech town in southern Bohemia, Cesky Krumlov. Some of the background artists and several members of the art crew went there to take a lot of reference photos, but the locations were inspired by Prague and the Czech Republic itself. Suda came up with the creative stuff (script, story, atmosphere), and Mikami provided a lot of ideas and advice, fine-tuning many of the details. He acted as a director, which was easy, but he supported Suda 100%. He also supported the remaster project, but the content is the same as the base game.

The remaster features the New Game+ mode and Garcia’s four new costumes (Placa Garcia = half-naked, tattooed Garcia; Demonio Gacia = demonic look, double attack power; Ocho Corazones = based on No More Heroes: Travis Strikes Again’s Eight Hearts; Kamikaze Garcia = based on Kurayami Dance manga character Kamikaze Wataru), we see graphical tuning and haptic feedback (DualSense controller), and on PC, mouse and keyboard are supported. No content has been cut or censored from the original. Sound is unchanged and graphics support 4K resolution, except for the Switch version, and frame rates up to 60fps.

Akira Yamaoka (of Team Silent fame) did not create any new songs for the remaster, which if it sells well enough, they would at least consider making a sequel. A sequel of sorts was already made in No More Heroes: Travis Strikes Again (Eight Hearts). If this were to happen, Eight Hearts would help Garcia, which would continue the Travis Strikes Again storyline, or it could be a prequel story where we learn how Garcia became a demon hunter. They are not tied to NetEase’s other in-house first-party studios. It could be some kind of collaboration with each studio doing their own thing. Grasshopper is working on a new IP (Suda can’t talk about it yet), and NetEase is testing how the studio will work with the Shadows of the Damned remaster.

If Garcia and Paula were to date, Suda says it would be in Tokyo because the country is relatively cheap now. They would probably go to a hot spring because there are so many in Japan. As for possible PlayStation and Xbox ports of No Meroes Heroes, he’d talk to Marvelous about it, and if Suda51 had a free hand, he’d rework an older Grasshopper title, Flower, Sun, and Rain, possibly Michigan. He’d like to see a remaster of Road Rash because he used to play it on the 3DO, and as for Burnout, he’s sad that it ended with Burnout Paradise and hopes that IP might get a new life.

Shadows of the Damned: Hella Remastered will be released on October 31 for PlayStation 5, Xbox Series, PC (Steam), PlayStation 4, Xbox One, and Nintendo Switch.

Source: Gematsu