Hellish Quart, a HEMA Sword Dueling Game
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A new fighting game has been brought to our attention and seeing only a few seconds of it already has me excited. Hellish Quart is a historical fighting game developed by Kubold and brings the fluid animations of motion captures fencing techniques physics-based blade collision.
Animation and Setting
Being developed by one of the animators of The Witcher III and mocap was done by Historical European Martial Artists (HEMA), the game is not only about recreating historic sword duels but also its setting of the 17th century Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth. Historical accuracy is an emphasis of Hellish Quart. So much so that the character models were made with 3D scanned clothing reproductions from the period and that the single-player campaign will reflect the realities of life in the region.
Real Fencing
Aside from the realistic mocap animations of the characters, the swords will clash and guard using game engine physics via an active ragdoll element. All damage your blade can do will be calculated in realtime and the sword blades will have active collision with each other, making the timing of your strikes crucial to victory. Or at the very least, not losing a limb or two. There will be a variety of different blades such as sabers, rapiers, broadswords, etc. Each with their accompanying fighting styles.
No release date has been set for the game as of yet. Though it has been listed on Steam for Early Access as the developers have mentioned that they wish for the game to have tight and precise controls while maintaining a good balance and wants players to be involved in testing and improving the game. Perhaps this will finally fill the void in our hearts that are yearning for a fighting game much like Bushido Blade or the Deadliest Warrior games where a match can end with a single solid sword strike.
