UFO ROBOT GRENDIZER – The Feast of the Wolves is an action-adventure title based on the beloved anime and manga, Goldorak, or as it’s also known, Grendizer. This exciting adaptation captures the heart of what made the original Grendizer so appealing and faithfully adapts its original creator’s vision, Go Nagai. Fans have been waiting decades for such a well-thought-out game adaptation, and if the fan reception is anything to go by, this has been a resounding success.
Challenge
Having originally been released in 2023 for PC, PlayStation, and Xbox platforms, Magic Media was tasked with porting UFO ROBOT GRENDIZER – The Feast of the Wolves to Nintendo Switch. This game porting project wouldn’t be a typical one where perhaps some minor adjustments would be required. Porting to the Nintendo Switch would require several significant overhauls so that the game could run optimally on the platform. Though challenging, the project was well within our skillset and experience thanks to our extensive experience with game porting projects in general, and our history of developing games for the Nintendo Switch console.
Solution
To deliver a high-quality port of UFO ROBOT GRENDIZER – The Feast of the Wolves to Nintendo Switch, we needed to revamp several critical components of the game. To accommodate the Switch’s capabilities, we had to adjust the entire graphical pipeline, the low-level way in which the game renders things on screen. This required adjusting the overall fidelity of visual assets and adjusting the game’s levels to ensure the game could run smoothly without sacrificing too much of its visual quality.
We also worked extensively to ensure that this version of the game would be a novel gaming experience that leveraged the Switch’s unique features as best as possible. Primarily, this meant preparing the game to run efficiently in both docked and undocked modes. While docked, the Switch is capable of better graphical output, with the GPU clock running much higher compared with its undocked mode. Furthermore, it’s capable of rendering games at 1080p while docked, compared to 720p while undocked. This necessitated diligent performance improvements to ensure that the game runs efficiently in both states.
All things considered, this wasn’t a typical game porting project. In the six-month timeframe we were provided, we managed to achieve the necessary improvements and optimizations, including significant overhauls such as changing up levels, to ensure that UFO ROBOT GRENDIZER – The Feast of the Wolves runs at the required framerate by Nintendo. In addition to the previously mentioned technical work, we also worked on the Japanese version of the game.
Results
While far from a traditional game porting project, this collaboration was technically engaging and rewarding. Our client was pleased with the final result, and we couldn’t be more appreciative of their open communication and collaboration, which greatly assisted us in completing this porting project to a high standard.
