The world of Zeno Clash returns with Clash: Artifacts Of Chaos

Chilean developers ACE Team have made a great many lovely games, but their most visually striking remains first-person brawlers Zeno Clash and its sequel. The series has remained dormant since 2013 - until now. At tonight's Nacon Connect, they announced Clash: Artifacts Of Chaos, a new game set in Zeno Clash's world. There's a new trailer below.

It's the character design that I love. They're either decidedly unsexy (surely?) anthropomorphic animals, or wrinkly scrotes. The protagonist this time looks like the latter: you're named Psuedo, and you become embroiled in a fight for the titular artifacts of chaos when you decide to protect your straightforwardly cute feather friend.

The core of the game remains first- and third-person brawling, but there's a framing device this time around in that the rules of combat are apparently determined "by a game of dice using artifacts with special properties." You have to collect these artifacts, but I don't know how the rules actually impact on your punching, blocking, countering fights.

What's more immediately exciting is that there's co-op this time, and the ability to challenge players to arena combat. The Zeno Clash games looked stunning but the actual fighting wasn't the deepest or richest; hopefully it has learned some lessons from the likes of Absolver in the years since.

You can find more information and images of the game over on Steam. It's currently targeting a June 2022 release date.