This morning is one that I will remember for the rest of my life. Cyberconnect2 kept hyping up an announcement they were holding on to for the 30th anniversary as a company. They revealed .hack//Z.E.R.O, a brand new entry for the .hack franchise!
Now, this might not be the remake many .hack fans were waiting for, me included. This does, however, give us news that Cyberconnect2 is finally back with making .hack content! The teaser that we get does reveal some new things, though, in the franchise. First off, there are four characters we see quite clearly. One is a twin-blade that looks like Kite from the original four games.
There is also a heavy blade female that looks very close to being Blackrose. The third character is a white knight that resembles Balmung. Kite first runs in a dungeon similar to those in the first series. Then he meets up with the fourth character, who resembles Aura. The trailer then focuses on Blackrose fighting Balmung. Kite then shows up and uses a bracelet similar to the one he has in the first series of games to start a data drain towards Balmung.
.hack//Z.E.R.O. looks heavily inspired by the first quadrilogy of the .hack series. This series has two sides to the world. The human side that deals with the person behind the screen, interacting with technology. And lastly, the MMORPG “The World”. One thing to note, too, in all the previous iterations of .hack, the main starting line is “Welcome to The World.” This time, the starting line is “Good Morning The World”. Already showing it will be different than what fans are used to.
Another interesting thing to note is that we do get a small glimpse of something familiar if you are a fan of the original quadrilogy, the sceptor of Skeith. In the original series, Skeith uses this to data drain Kite’s best friend Yasuhiko. This is what sets Kite on his journey in the first place: he wants to wake his friend up from the coma that Skeith’s data drain causes.
The error message you get from the game after Kite meets up with Aura is also known as TWILIGHT.exe. This is a reference to the Book of Twilight that gives Kite his bracelet. The bracelet is also known as the Twilight Bracelet. In the first four games, the bracelet is tied to Cubia, meaning every time the bracelet gets stronger, so does Cubia. This might still be the case in .hack//Z.E.R.O. or it could be the non-shadow version of the Twilight Bracelet.
It feels surreal to end this here, but .hack//Z.E.R.O. is currently in development. No release time frame has been given, but just knowing we will get another .hack game is enough for me!
Source: Cyberconnect2’s YouTube channel
