Dragon: Marked for Death was Almost a PSP Title

Inti Creates has been around for a while, with the bulk of its history being on Nintendo handhelds. PlayStation fans will likely know the developer most, for better or worse, for its work on Mighty No. 9 and the Bloodstained series. The company produced a couple licensed titles for the PSP in Japan, but no “original” work. however, Inti Creates’ CEO recently revealed that an upcoming Nintendo Switch game originally started its life on Sony’s handheld, roughly ten years ago.

プロモーションプランを最終調整中です。どういった情報を出して行けそうか古い資料までひっくり返していたら、津田さんの書いた草案を発見！制作日付は2008年8月18日・・・。何年作ってるんだよ！って話です。最初はPSPで作ろうとしてましたが、その辺りをインタビューしてくれるメディアさん募集(笑) pic.twitter.com/QKhfMBftKY

— Takuya Aizu (@t_aizu) January 14, 2019

The game is question is Dragon: Marked for Death, a 2D action game that has been a passion project of sorts over at Inti Creates for a long time. While Inti Creates recently spoke of the game’s past as a 3DS title, CEO Takuya Aizu took to Twitter with materials going back even further. These design concept documents, such as the controls layout image above, date back to 2008 and the PlayStation Portable. The visuals, which you can see in action via the Nintendo Switch trailer below, even look like they haven’t changed a whole lot, conceptually.

The documents, which have been translated over at Siliconera, state that Dragon: Marked for Death in its original PSP state was designed as a four-player, co-op action game in a similar style to Mega Man. The target audience was office workers in their 20s, and the game’s multiplayer would of course function via the PSP’s Ad-hoc and Infrastructure options.

While it isn’t clear what caused this game’s path to extend over ten years, we do know development moved over to Nintendo 3DS for a time, before finally settling down on the Nintendo Switch. It is currently set to launch on January 31, 2019. While Dragon: Marked for Death isn’t a PlayStation title, fans of the Inti Creates style can check out the Gunvolt series while they wait for Bloodstained: Ritual of the Night.

[Source: Twitter, translation via Siliconera]