So a Klonoa demo is live on the Japanese eShop. It has english language options so presumably the demo is dropping in the North American eShop at some point.
My initial impressions are keep your graphical expectations in check. It's had some touch ups over the Wii remake, but it's still in that general ballpark visually. It does look to have original difficulty options at least.
Can I interject here? (No? Well, I'm doing it anyway.)
I played through the Playstation version of Klonoa at the turn of the century, because a friend recommended it and loaned his copy to me. Years later, I bought the Wii version of the game but didn't play that one much. I mean, it's fine. It looks better than the Playstation version, because of course it does, but watching the footage on YouTube reminds me of a creative liberty which doesn't ruin the game outright, but does blunt its narrative.
Basically, Klonoa was aged up in the Wii game. They've made him roughly sixteen, he's got longer limbs, and he looks and acts a lot like Sonic... confident, cocky, headstrong, kind of puerile in a teenage way. He even sounds like Sonic if you turn on the English language option. Playstation Klonoa was not like this. He was probably eight, with a squat build and a squeaky voice and a youthful exuberance and a child-like innocence. He doesn't know the harsh realities of life...
but he's about to find out.
The ending of Klonoa is harsh and traumatic. It wrings a tear out of your eye even as an adult, but for a CHILD, what happens would hit with the force of a wrecking ball. Making Klonoa older diminishes its narrative impact. A sixteen year old would be moderately affected by the loss, but for an eight year old, it would be seismic. It would change how they saw the world, forever leaving their perspective tarnished and cracked. That ending represents a loss of innocence and wonder, and at sixteen you'd have a lot less of both to lose.
Recently, I watched the demo of the new Klonoa remake. It looks a lot like the Wii version with sharper, shinier graphics, but they also used the eight year old version of Klonoa, which comes as a relief. The game just doesn't work as well with an older Klonoa.
