Nintendo's Indie World Showcase brought about a lot of newly announced games and some titles that had been previously available on other platforms were confirmed to be coming to the Nintendo Switch too. On the side of the latter, indie band biopic game We Are OFK was announced to be coming to the Switch alongside PlayStation consoles. In terms of new games though, publisher Devolver Digital announced that it was again working with Doinksoft on a new game known as Gunbrella.
Gunbrella puts players in charge of a woodsman seeking revenge in a pixelated noir-punk action-adventure experience. The player is armed with the titular Gunbrella, a gun that, as expected, can also turn into a strong umbrella to block incoming projectiles and even give players some extra jumping and gliding prowess. Gunbrella is a sidescroller, meaning that players can use their umbrella almost like a power-up in platforming games. Devolver Digital has put out some intense sidescrollers before, such as Katana Zero.
Katana Zero was a neo-noir rather than a punk-noir, but also featured a sense of mystery due to the protagonist suffering from amnesia. Gunbrella will feature some intense combat too, as it showed off gameplay of what appeared to be a boss fight against a giant rat. Weird creatures seem very much to be a part of Gunbrella's world, as some odd characters will be enemies, while others will help the player in their quest for revenge.
Gunbrella's world is dependent on a rapidly diminishing natural resource, according to developer Doinksoft, who has worked on previous Devolver titles such as Demon Throttle and Gato Roboto, with the latter being a Metroidvania game about a cat. The player's investigation will become "entangled with the inner workings of ghouls and gangsters, cops and cultists, and the fallout of corporate exploitation," Doinksoft describes. Due to the dystopian nature of Gunbrella's world, resources to upgrade the player's weapon will be fairly scarce, though the firearm and umbrella can be improved upon.
As well as having exciting combat and an interesting setting, Gunbrella will also allow players to use their detective skills in order to both find their own revenge and support the game's side characters. Similarly to other successful detective games like Disco Elysium, Gunbrella will allow for a player's choice to influence the outcome of a given quest, as shown in the trailer when two NPCs request the same gem.
Gunbrella launches in 2023 for PC and Switch.