Namco today announced its newest PlayStation Portable project, an Action RPG titled Bounty Hounds. In the year 23XX, mankind has begun to remodel planets so that it can exist on them. During the execution of this bold plan however, mankind encounters an Extraterrestrial Intelligence (ETI) and is quickly drawn into a bitter conflict with these aliens. For the dirty work in this conflict, mercenaries are employed. These mercenary forces are made up entirely of discharged former soldiers, former prisoners and mafia types. They are generally referred to as Bounty Hounds.

Players will control one of those Bounty Hounds, a man called Maximilian Web. In the mission-based game, Max will fight hordes of aliens. Upon being defeated, those hostile creatures have the nice habit of dropping weapons and items. These weapons and items can then in turn be upgraded by the player.

In the real-time battles, Max can wield firearms for long-range fighting, and swords, hammers and other weaponry for short-range fighting in both hands to fight his way through the aliens coming his way. Namco will use know-how from its two flagship fighting game series Soul Calibur and Tekken to realize a very action-oriented gameplay. Furthermore, Bounty Hounds will support a player versus player mode via a wireless ad-hoc connection. The game sharing option will also be supported.

In addition to cutscenes whose design is reminiscent of Metal Gear Acid's, the game will also offer beautiful 3D CG scenes.

Bounty Hounds will be released in Japan on October 27th for 4,800 yen ($43.12 USD).

• IT Media Games