Its pretty rare to still play original Game Boy cartridges in 2021. But hey, if that’s you, here’s a nice surprise.
British developer -IZMA- and publisher Spacebot Interactive have opened up preorders for Deadeus. It’s an 8-bit top-down horror adventure with a twist, the twist being that you can buy it as an original Game Boy, Game Boy Color and Game Boy Advance physical cartridge.
The actual conceit of Deadeus sounds pretty cool. You’re a small kid who receives a prophecy via a horrific nightmare: everyone you know and love is going to die in 3 days. It’s up to the player to decide how that pans out, which sounds an awful lot like seeing who lives or dies.
There’s 11 separate endings and if you want the physical edition, it’ll start shipping some time in March. (Coming from Europe, I’d expect early April just to be on the safe side.) It’s not the first new Game Boy title from Spacebot — they’re actually due to start shipping physical copies of Dragonborne, a six to seven-hour long adventure with some puzzling and JRPG turn-based elements.
As for Deadeus, however, there’s a full trailer for the game below. It’s got a great, gloomy style. It’s also available directly as a Windows port or a ROM file, in case you don’t actually have a working Game Boy/Advance/Color lying around anywhere.
There’s also a free version of the game available on Itch.io, although if you like you what you play it’s worth sending the developer a bit of money. I love seeing that small studios, publishers and communities are still working on games like this. Boundaries are always a great tool for creativity, and the Game Boy is just as capable of hosting remarkable games as any other console or platform.
To grab the physical version of Deadeus, head to Spacebot’s official page. You can also check out -IZMA-‘s other work here.
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