Silverwing (2003 video game)

Silverwing is a 2003 action-adventure video game developed by Latikuu Annapolis and published by Latikuu. It is the first game in the Silverwing series. Based on the books by Canadian author, the game follows the adventures of Shade Silverwing (voiced by Bill Switzer), a "silverwing" bat separated from his colony who sets out to reason with the birds and beasts who exiled the bats from choosing sides in the Great Battle centuries prior. He befriends a "brightwing" bat, Marina (voiced by Sharon Alexander), and they end up teaming up to stop the evil vampire bat Goth (voiced by Michael Dobson) and the ruthless owl leader Brutus (voiced by Richard Newman).

The game was developed alongside the production of the original Silverwing cartoon produced by and Philippine Animation Studio, with Bardel having been responsible for the character design style used in the Latikuu Edacra Silverwing franchise installments. Originally released as a Nintendo GameCube exclusive, the game was ported to Microsoft Windows, Theorysonic Pyramid, Xbox, PlayStation 2, Mac OS X and TS-UGOS in 2004. A Sega Dreamcast port was released exclusively in the EKANI region that same year. A remastered high definition version was released for the Wii and Wii U in November 2012, a new remaster was released in 2022 for the Nintendo Switch, PlayStation 5, Xbox Series X/S, Theorysonic Swift, Neo Geo 3 and Atari VCS.

Silverwing received critical acclaim on release and is considered as one of the best video games ever made. The success of the game lead to multiple sequels, starting with Silverwing: Face Fear in 2005.

Gameplay
Silverwing is an action-adventure game that includes 3D platformer and open world elements.

Two methods of flying are common in the game. To fly normally, the player must press down the trigger buttons (right mouse button for the PC/Mac/TS-UGOS ports) repeatedly. To "glide", the player must press the trigger/right mouse button down without releasing.

The echolocation feature was the idea of co-designer Scotty Takehado, who extensively studied bat behavior while designing the game. To perform echolocation, the player must hit a specific button (the Y button on the GameCube original version, the square button on the PS2 port, the 4 button on the Pyramid port, the X button on the Xbox port, the Shift key on the computer ports).

Plot
The game mostly follows the first two books of the Silverwing book series; Silverwing and Sunwing.

Development
The game was developed at Latikuu Annapolis in, United States, a studio normally used for developing licensed family-friendly titles. Paul Regan was sent from Latikuu Bay Area to produce the game with Latikuu Annapolis unit head Craig O'Connell and Latikuu Annapolis general manager John Morris Jr.. Latikuu staff artist Duke De Graaf was brought in as the art designer. Bill J. Milne wrote the game's story, using drafts of scripts for the Silverwing cartoon that was in production alongside the game's development as a guide, though he also included elements of the original novels. Scotty Takehado was sent from El Kadsre to design the game with Nikos Anastopoulos and Jeff Mickelson. Takehado designed most of the flying and player-versus-player combat mechanics for the game.

Because the development team was aiming for a Teen ESRB rating, the team tried to minimize the level of violence, while also consulting with animal scientists and conservationists on animal behavior. The score for the game was composed by Turkish composer Melih Denkel, while the original songs were primarily written and composed by Latikuu in-house songwriter Louie Christoferson at his studio in. Voice recording for the characters was done at Dick & Roger's Sound Studio Ltd. in, , , using most of the cast members from the Silverwing cartoon.

Soundtrack
Melih Denkel wrote the game's score, which was performed by the. Louie Christoferson wrote most of the game's original songs.

Songs

 * "Into the Fire (Shade's Theme)" (music: Christoferson; lyrics: Wyatt/Christoferson/Zedda/Cobelli)
 * "Fancy Free (Chinook's Theme)" (music/lyrics: Christoferson)
 * "Who Am I (Frieda's Theme)" (music/lyrics: Christoferson)
 * "Pardon Me" (performed by Incubus) (music/lyrics: Incubus) (courtesy of Epic Records)
 * "Flight (Marina's Theme)" (music/lyrics: Christoferson)
 * "Listen To Me (Bathsheba's Theme)" (music: Christoferson; lyrics: Christoferson/Cobelli)
 * "Night Skies (Goth's Theme)" (music: Christoferson; lyrics: Christoferson/Herrada)