A free-to-play first-person shooter set in the cyberpunk future of the anime classic Ghost in the Shell is coming out later this year. Korean publisher Nexon is debuting the game in the North America, Europe, Latin America, New Zealand and Australia, followed by a global release. Beta signups will begin in the second quarter of 2015. With Deus Ex: Mankind Divided recently revealed, fans of cyberpunk action have plenty to look forward to.
Nexon is best known for publishing free-to-play MMORPGs like MapleStory and Mabinogi. Its market is primarily based in east Asia at the moment, but the publisher has set its sights on the west by snatching up Gears of War creator Cliff Bleszinski’s upcoming arena shooter, BlueStreak.
The game is specifically based on the fantastic anime spinoff series, Ghost in the Shell: Stand Alone Complex. The series is set in a mid-21st-century cyberpunk Tokyo, filled with artificial intelligence, cyborg augmentation, and consciousness uploading, and smartly explores the possibilities and dangers of our current technological course, projected into its blue-sky future. It follows Section 9, an elite counterterrorism squad of cyborgs led by Major Motoko Kusanagi, a buxom badass right out of a 12-year-old boy’s fevered imagination.
In Ghost in the Shell Online, players will be able to create and customize their own cyborg badass with unlockable skills and upgrades. Characters will be able to share abilities with nearby allies, allowing you and your friends to develop a complementary squad for both PVP- and PVE-type matches.
Ghost in the Shell Online‘s western release may be aimed to capitalize on the upcoming live-action film adaptation. The movie, which has no set release date, will star Scarlett Johansson and be helmed by Snow White and the Huntsman director Rupert Sanders.
