More Sadness details

Polish developer Nibris has revealed a few more details about its noirish gothic horror Nintendo Wii title Sadness.

Due out "no sooner than" Q4 2007, Sadness is inspired by the likes of Eternal Darkness and Planescape: Torment and will feature no menu and an invisible save system.

That's in addition to a completely black-and-white graphical style, which Nibris claims is moving towards photo-realism.

The game's mostly set in Ukraine prior to the outbreak of World War I, and early artwork has shown monsters inspired by Slavic legends. The latest press info includes a chunk on werewolves, which presumably feature.

Nibris has drafted in Frontline Studios to handle programming and Digital Amigos to handle the visual side of the game, the company said, but "all the names of alleged publishers which appear on the internet are nothing but rumours".

The team's also reluctant to talk about plot specifics. "Both the story and the presentation of the game is going to be a surprise for a player," one of the scriptwriters, Adam Artur Antolski, said.

"You must forgive us the fact that we present so scarce information about Sadness, but we hope that once you play it you will understand our circumspection. We do not want to spoil the fun."

Nibris also listed a range of influences - Eternal Darkness, Silent Hill, Resident Evil, Planescape: Torment, ICO and Phantasmagoria - which had a bearing on the "concept design".

As for why there's no menu: "We aim at completely intuitive behaviour of the player - just as in life," the company said.

"Every choice a player makes is essential - if you experience traumatic events in your life, they are in you all the time. The same is going to be with Sadness. We want the player feel he participates in events, not only a game."

Right then. More on Sadness when Nibris says so, by the sound of it.