Shenmue Creator Reveals New Game

Bandai Namco has announced Steel Paws, its next game from the creative mind of Yu Suzuki, the creator of Sega’s groundbreaking Shenmue and Virtua Fighter game franchises. Steel Paws is coming in 2025 as a mobile-exclusive title, and its style is something that fans of Suzuki’s greatest hits like Shenmue may not be expecting.

While Suzuki has been making games since 1984 and enjoyed early success with the 1986 racing game Out Run, which he designed, his longest-lasting series has been Shenmue, an action-adventure title released for the Dreamcast in 1999. Suzuki has written, directed, and produced all three mainline games in the series, with Shenmue 3 releasing in November 2019. He also pioneered the 3D fighting game genre in 1993 as director and producer of Virtua Fighter, the first fighting game ever to feature full 3D polygonal graphics, and he went on to serve as director of five and producer of four more games in that franchise.

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The brief Steel Paws announcement came at The Game Awards 2024 in the form of a 30-second-long anime-style cinematic trailer, which shows a purple-haired feminine protagonist in futuristic red armor lounging on a sunny hill with three catlike robots. The action ramps up as a column of mystical light rises from a Roman-style colosseum, which begins to spin rapidly as the four heroes prepare to spring into action. In between the action scenes, the trailer makes sure the audience knows that Suzuki is the driving force behind the game.

Where Will Steel Paws Be Available?

Steel Paws will be available exclusively through the Netflix Games streaming service. According to the official Netflix news page, players will team up with their upgradable Buddy Robots to explore a tower that reveals itself once every 1,000 years. Netflix has been offering mobile game access to its streaming service customers in select regions since November 2021, with access first coming to the U.S. market directly through the Netflix mobile app in late 2023. While many of the games are Netflix originals, including some games based around Netflix shows like Stranger Things and The Queen’s Gambit, the service has expanded to include some more mainstream titles as well, such as Civilization 6 and multiple Grand Theft Auto titles.

The announcement of Steel Paws wasn’t Netflix’s only surprise at The Game Awards. Netflix will be releasing Squid Game Unleashed, a party game, on December 17. The game will allow players access for a limited time at launch regardless of whether they are Netflix subscribers, and it arrives just ahead of the violent Korean drama’s season two premiere, which is coming to Netflix on December 26.

Steel Paws

Systems

Released

2025-00-00

Developer(s)

Ys Net