Rick is annoyed, and when Rick's annoyed, limbs start coming off. NAMCO BANDAI Games Europe takes great gruesome pleasure in officially announcing the re-imagining of the 1988 arcade flesh-fest Splatterhouse, coming to Europe and the PAL territories in 2010 for the Xbox 360® video game and entertainment system from Microsoft and PlayStation®3. It's a fine line between harmless and arm-less
» Read More 

Splatterhouse will Now developed internally by Namco Bandai Games America, Splatterhouse will be available in Q3 2010 for the PlayStation 3 and Xbox 360.
» Read More 

Siliconera: The revival of Splatterhouse has been a rocky ride. The last thing we heard is staff from Bottlerocket, the studio pulled from developing the game, are partially back on the project. Since Splatterhouse wasn't at E3 I asked Namco Bandai to give me an update about it.

Surge, the team that developed Afro Samurai, is working on Splatterhouse with some help from "a team in San Diego". A demo wasn't shown at E3 so the team could focus on making the game, not just a demo. While development is progressing, the game won't come out this year. Currently, Splatterhouse is on target for "early 2010."
» Read More 

Apparently Namco Bandai's problem wasn't with the people making "Splatterhouse" at Bottlerocket. It was the management, or at least its deal with them.

According to a source close to the project, and several others familiar with the situation, Namco Bandai has quietly opened a new office in San Diego to finish production on its game "Splatterhouse" and recruited between 10 and 20 designers, artists, programmers, producers, and other staff from Bottlerocket Entertainment to work on the game.
» Read More 

Chris Remo at Gamasutra writes: "BottleRocket Entertainment, former developer of the upcoming Splatterhouse, has responded pointedly to claims by a Namco Bandai executive that the studio's removal was for "performance" reasons.

Last month, in a widely reported action, publisher Namco Bandai ended BottleRocket's involvement in the production of the franchise followup, reclaiming development equipment and assets.

Speaking to Gamasutra in an interview published last week, Namco Bandai Games COO Makoto Iwai said the move was made due to a "performance issue" with BottleRocket."
» Read More 

Leigh Alexander on Gamasutra writes:

"BottleRocket today officially confirmed that it will no longer be developing Namco Bandai's Splatterhouse after the publisher repossessed the title earlier this week -- but says it is working on an unannounced new project, disputing earlier reports of its de facto demise.

'BottleRocket wishes Namco the best in completing their project,' the studio said in a brief statement confirming the cancellation. 'The BottleRocket development team is looking forward to turning their attention to a new project soon to be announced.' "
» Read More 

California-based developer Bottlerocket Entertainment is no longer working on Splatterhouse for the Xbox 360 and Playstation 3, Namco confirmed to Kotaku today.

"We have decided to part ways with BottleRocket Entertainment but we are committed to bringing Splatterhouse to the Xbox 360 and PlayStation 3 later this year," a Namco spokesperson told Kotaku. "At this time, we are not ready to discuss specific development details about the game and wish BottleRocket the best of luck in their future endeavors."
» Read More 

Namco has reportedly pulled the Splatterhouse project from developer Bottlerocket and given it to its in-house Afro Samurai team.

Sources close to the company have said that Namco repossessed all dev kits and assets associated with the game, leaving Bottlerocket in the unfortunate position of having no other projects to work on.
» Read More 

On the same day the Splatterhouse trailer debuted, Namco is rumored to have pulled the unfinished project from Bottlerocket, dooming the California-based developer.

Sources through the San Diego-area dev community - but not with Bottlerocket itself - say Namco showed up Friday and took back the dev kits and all assets for Splatterhouse. Word has it Namco intends to finish it in house with the Afro Samurai team.
» Read More 

Splatterhouse developer BottleRocket Entertainment has gone bust, says an apparently solid rumour.
» Read More 

Joystiq writes: "'Everybody wants that,' exclaimed Splatterhouse co-producer Mark Brown, responding to a question about the original 1988 beat-em-up's inclusion in the forthcoming franchise reboot. "In one form, we're gonna deliver on it," concluded Brown, who was joined by writer Gordon Rennie in a design panel at New York Comic Con today.

Brown, who is producing the new Splatterhouse alongside Dan Tovar, called the original, the "crown jewel of the [Namco] back catalog," and confirmed the plan to bundle the classic arcade game (also ported to Turbografx-16 -- and now on Virtual Console) as an extra in the new game, perhaps as a "premium edition" bonus."
» Read More 

Namco Bandie and Bottlerocket have released new details of their upcoming 80's horror remake of Splatterhouse.
» Read More 

Worthplaying Writes: "Splatterhouse follows college student Rick Taylor as he tries to rescue his girlfriend, Jennifer, who has disappeared after entering the mysterious and run-down West Mansion. Confronted by horrific other-worldly creatures, Rick comes across a mystical sentient mask that promises to give him the power to find Jennifer. Full of desperation and rage, Rick puts on the "Terror Mask" and is transformed into a juggernaut of pure violence and destruction. Featuring an original storyline by critically-acclaimed comic book writer Gordon Rennie (Necronauts, Judge Dredd), Splatterhouse takes Rick beyond the mansion as he scours the ends of the world to rescue his beloved Jennifer.

Several factors played a major role in the selection process for the technology that will bring to market the unique mix of the brawler and survival horror genres found in Splatterhouse. Most important, Gamebryo's flexible and modular features with easy-to-extend, fully-documented APIs allows BottleRocket to focus on game creativity. The company is also impressed with the ability to quickly develop prototypes and get to first-playables simultaneously across multiple platforms as they did with Splatterhouse. This is done with Gamebryo's Floodgate stream processing engine that makes it possible to simultaneously develop for multi-core systems – across multiple architectures – ensuring all SKUs can be released simultaneously."
» Read More 

Do you have a Love Jones for BLOOD and a lot of it. Do not fear everyones favorite masked guy from times long ago is here to fulfill your gruesome fantasies. NO! NOT Jason, Brandnew Splatterhouse Screenshots have been released. You can definately find them at the place to be AnalogHype.com
» Read More 

Splatterhouse, a classic action-combat arcade title launched back in 1988, is set to make a surprise comeback on next-generation consoles next year, according to Namco Bandai.
» Read More