Namco Bandai's got a new oldschool 2D beat-'em-up called Invincible Tiger: The Legend of Han Tao coming to Xbox Live Arcade and PlayStation Network. And by "oldschool," I mean "pretty simplistic." Judging by a quick hands-on demo, the game seems to use one button for punches, one for kicks, one for jumps, and one to interact with occasional background elements. You can move into and out of the background in some spots. Mostly it's about beating up a bunch of kung fu fighters and jumping around a lot. There's not a lot to the action, which at least means it's a pick-up-and-play sort of thing.
Han Tao's main hook, however, is stereoscopic 3D support. You know, like the red-and-blue glasses you get at the movie theater? Kind of like that. Namco Bandai had some fancy electronic 3D glasses at their demo which worked with a sensor mounted on top of the TV, but a company rep said the game will let you use a variety of different kinds of 3D glasses. Since this is a downloadable game, there obviously won't be any glasses included with your purchase, though the rep implied some kind of announcement about a glasses tie-in may be forthcoming.
The game has a real chop-socky '70s kung fu movie vibe going on, with a dirty-looking film grain filter and such, so the 3D thing seems appropriate here. And I have to admit, the seemingly shallow action became somewhat more appealing when there were little kung fu dudes flying out of the TV and straight at my face. I hope Namco makes it easy to obtain some compatible glasses, though; it may be hard to muster the effort to track some down, otherwise.
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Check out this trailer for a two-dimensional taste of the gameplay and visual style.