'South Park: Snow Day', 'TMNT: The Last Ronin' Video Games Coming From THQ Nordic

 
It's gaming m'kay? On Friday, August 12, THQ Nordic held a digital showcase for upcoming titles, and two of those showcased titles were licensed games for major Paramount properties: South Park and Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles.

South Park: Snow Day is a new 3D co-op multiplayer game coming to Xbox Series X/S, PlayStation 5, and PC next year. Stan, Cartman, Kyle, Kenny, Butters and their classmates celebrate as the latest snowstorm cancels school for another snow day. Even for Colorado kids the occasion can still be quite magical, even if the show itself had never done a snow day episode. Cartman being in his Grand Wizard King costume while other classmates are also in their fantasywear. Not much else is known about the game, so it is believed that the South Park Elementary student body will once again immerse themselves in their fantasy role play game in this newer environment. 

The game was clearly made with heart and such attention to detail, insofar as including the restaurant Nueva Familia, from a single season 19 episode “You Aren’t Helping”. References as deep as that or more may be expected based on such. The game is developed by Question Games, which has produced games including 2015's The Magic Circle, a fantasy puzzle game, and the 2019 first-person co-op horror game The Blackout Club.

Lately, South Park has been absent from the gaming sphere, as this is the franchise's first title since 2017. The last console release, South Park: The Fractured but Whole, a 2D turn-based RPG made by Ubisoft for PlayStation 4, Windows, Xbox One, and Nintendo Switch, happened that year as did for the mobile title South Park: Phone Destroyer for Android and iOS by RTS. As for the TV series, while the main part of season 26 aired over February and March, there are two specials still coming to Paramount+. While last year’s were released in the summer, presumably due to its waterpark plot points, this year’s are looking at October and December releases, respectively, according to our sources. Snow Day’s reveal trailer can be watched below.

THQ Nordic also confirmed an adaptation of the acclaimed IDW comic miniseries Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: The Last Ronin, following a report from Polygon in March. Polygon had learned of such from Doug Rosen, the senior vice president for games and emerging media at Paramount Global.

Because it was an “in development” announcement, no release window has been revealed, but the game will be available on PlayStation 5, Xbox Series X|S, and PC. The trailer therefore doesn’t reveal much, instead relying on themes and symbolism to be of any relevant visual substance. That is aside from text calling it the "official adaptation" of the comic series of the same name from Kevin Eastman, Tom Waltz, Ben Bishop, Luis Antonio Delgado, and Esau and Isaac Escorza. Whether any of them are actually involved directly with the game is unclear.

Black Forest Games, one of many THQ Nordic-owned developers, is indicated to be involved. Black Forest has recently developed include Titan Quest and the newer Destroy All Humans! games including the 2020 remaster of the original, the multiplayer component Destroy All Humans! Clone Carnage, and Destroy All Humans! 2: Reprobed. Nickelodeon is involved as well, presumably as IP owners at the very least.

As far as the premise of the game, of course it’s going to lift from the synopsis of the comic it’s adapting, reading

"Who is the Last Ronin? In a future, battle-ravaged New York City, a lone surviving Turtle embarks on a seemingly hopeless mission seeking justice for the family he lost," a preview of the book explained. "From legendary TMNT co-creators Kevin Eastman and Peter Laird, get ready for the final story of the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles three decades in the making! What terrible events destroyed his family and left New York a crumbling, post-apocalyptic nightmare? All will be revealed in this climactic Turtle tale that sees longtime friends becoming enemies and new allies emerging in the most unexpected places. Can the surviving Turtle triumph?"

It’s a darker story clearly, about Michelangelo, so he’s going to be the main focus and character played in a third-person format that Rosen likened it to God of War and its sequel God of War Ragnarok. He suggested that other characters might be playable, too, but that'd be through flashbacks. The reveal trailer is below.

Sources: IGN (1, 2), ComicBook, Polygon