Before River City Girls became a smash hit, Shantae was WayForward's most popular game series. These games star Shantae, a half-genie hero who can cast spells and transform into animals as she battles pirates and monsters. The most recent game, Shantae and the Seven Sirens, was quite good. There is a Shantae that players have never gotten to try before: Shantae Advance: Risky Revolution, a game that was canceled in 2004. 21 years later, WayForward is finally releasing Risky Revolution and on consoles and Steam this summer.
Official description:
Shantae is back in a 2D side-scrolling action-adventure game 20 years in the making! The nefarious pirate Risky Boots has a “groundbreaking” new plan that will leave Sequin Land spinning — by rotating the continent, she can move any town right to the coast for easy plundering! As Shantae, turn the tectonic tables on Risky by taking control of the land itself: shift, twist, navigate, and explore by swapping between mix-and-match multilayered levels! Hair-whip and belly-dance your way through scrambled lands, misplaced towns, monster-filled crypts, and daunting labyrinths. Six creature transformations, fierce boss battles, and a 4-player versus mode await!
- Discover the lost chapter of the Shantae saga, fully restored and released after 20 years!
- Fight and explore using your hair-whipping ability, magic items, and belly-dance transformations (including monkey, elephant, crab, and more)!
- Thwart Risky's twisted plot in classic visual mode or with high-def portraits and menus!
- Spin and shift Front Yard and Back Yard playfields to create new routes and solve puzzles!
- Visit towns, battle through labyrinths, purchase upgrades, find collectables, and meet with friends like Rottytops, Sky, and Bolo!
- For the first time ever in a Shantae game, four players can compete in Battle Mode!
To be clear, WayForward already finished up and released Risky Revolution for GameBoy Advance in April of this year. Still, GBA is a mostly defunct platform, so the chance to play this long-lost Shantae game on modern platforms is truly special.
Shantae Advance: Risky Revolution will be released on Xbox, PlayStation, Switch, and Steam this summer. We can't wait until it's Ret-2-Go!