PS3-exclusive shooter Starhawk announced. It’s Warhawk in space…

Another day, another pre-E3 announcement of a new game. Come on guys, leave us something for the show! Anyhow, Sony have announced new third-person shooter Starhawk as a PS3 exclusive. On first inspection, it looks like an updated Warhawk in space.

And that’d be because it’s from new developer Lightbox Interactive, which was formed a couple of years ago by folks from Incognito Entertrainment, who made, yes, Warhawk (and Twisted Metal Black). Lightbox Interactive are working with Sony Santa Monica Studio, who are perhaps most famous for the the God Of War games.

Here’s a little video about the studio (Warning: includes cupcakes. You may wish to visit a bakery first to avoid pangs of hunger jealousy).

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L9B42kUf5tA

Like Warhawk, Starhawk is a third-person shooter that mixes up the on-foot action with ground-based vehicle combat and aerial scrapping too. The marked difference between the two games, aside from the space setting, is that Starhawk contains a full single-player campaign. Warhawk’s single-player element was canned during development. There is of course multiplayer action too, with 32-player competitive online play and a 4-player co-op mode available both online and off.  One other difference – there’s no Six Axis support this time. Praise be.

In the single-player campaign you’ll play as the stupendously named Emmett Graves, a part-mutant and part-human dude who finds himself embroiled in a scrap between humans and full mutants on a planet called Dust. They’re fighting over something called Rift Energy, see, and as well as being the planet’s major resource, this is the stuff that’s caused all the mutations. It’ll all make sense, I’m sure. 

While Starhawk’s story sounds rather so-so, the actual  game bit of the game appears more promising.  This link to a video feature on gametrailers.com shows off some Starhawk gameplay in action, with our man Graves blasting the crap out of mutants and giant robots, hopping into Transformer-alike robots-cum-aircraft and generally raising havoc in the barren environments of planet Dust.

[/caption] The official gumph also promises that you’ll be able to alter the dynamic of the battlefield in real-time by calling in support from an orbiting dropship. Warhawk allowed you to drop in turrets to provide tactical assistance and it’s similar in Starhawk. You’ll be able to react to situations and place suport buildings and vehicles where you see fit, something that could provide a nice unique-ish feel to the adverserial multiplayer modes.

Starhawk looks pretty decent upon first inspection. We can expect more details and some hands-on time with the game come E3.

The Starhawk release date is currently a loose 2012.

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