Development on the Steam version of El Shaddai continues, for a possible 10th anniversary release

Publication date of the original Japanese article: 2020-12-08 15:05 (JST)
Translated by. Ari Clark

On December 7, Japanese game creator Takeyasu Sawaki spoke publicly about the state of progress on the Steam version of his game, El Shaddai. He hopes to continue to share relevant information via Twitter.

El Shaddai is a 3D action game released in 2011 for the PlayStation 3 and Xbox 360. One of a series of fictional works by Takeyasu Sawaki based around “mythical concepts”, it spins its tale using creation mythology as a motif. It features a human called Enoch, who throws himself into battle to capture fallen angels in order to impede the heavenly Council’s plan to unleash a Great Flood.

The development team disbanded after the game’s release, leaving their tale unfinished; however, the story was supplemented with a combination of mixed media, including novels and comics. The series has continued to develop in its own unique ways, such as with the release of another game in the same universe, The Lost Child, in 2017.

The biggest factor that thrust El Shaddai into the spotlight was a particular moment from a promotional video shown before its release. As Enoch dons some iron armor and sets off to do battle in the mortal world, his guide, the archangel Lucifel, asks him, “You sure that’s enough armor?” Brimming with confidence, Enoch replies, “No problem. Everything’s fine,” and descends to the mortal world, where he unfortunately gets beaten to a pulp in an instant.

At that point, a heavenly voice rings out from who-knows-where: “The Lord has spoken – this is not your appointed time to die.” With those words, time rewinds itself, and the scene returns to the moment just before Enoch flies off to the mortal world. When he is once again asked, “You sure that’s enough armor?”, Enoch meekly responds, “I’ll take the best you’ve got,” and is clad in his distinctive white armor. Swooping down once again, Enoch easily turns the tables on his foes, and triumphs with a smug grin on his face.

The beautiful, whimsical, and artistic visual style that the game adopts, and the lofty themes that it deals with, including angels and God, made the surreal exchanges between Enoch and Lucifel into a signature feature of the game, as they deliver their ridiculous dialogue with completely straight faces. The incongruity is so giggle-inducing that it became an overnight sensation at the time of the video’s release.

It turned into an internet meme, especially on platforms such as NicoNico Douga, and the aforementioned line from Lucifel won first place in the Net Buzzword Awards 2010 Grand Prix in Japan. Also, material from the game that included clips and screenshots of the infamous scene was officially released as a free resource for public use on April Fool’s Day in 2018, as the franchise continues to develop in its own surprising way.

In a 2018 interview with Japanese gaming website Game*Spark, Takeyasu alluded to development of a Steam port for El Shaddai. The gist of his statement was that he’d been working to make it a reality, but that there had been a disconnect with the development environment at the time and it had been a rough process. Since then, further reports on the matter had ceased; however, with this latest tweet, it seems like the project is confirmed to be making progress again.

Currently, they are apparently working on a launcher that can handle multiple alternative options and provides an option to switch between languages, due to the change in platform compatibility. The PC version will apparently support audio and subtitles for at least two languages, English and Japanese. Sawaki also expressed his hope in the Twitter replies that it would be ready in time for El Shaddai’s 10th anniversary, so the odds are high that the release date will be sometime in April 2021.

For more information about the Steam version of El Shaddai, check out the status updates on Takeyasu’s Twitter account.