Serious Sam First & Second Encounter To Appear On Xbox 360 In HD At Retail

Excellent news from Mastertronic this afternoon as we learn that the first two games in the legendarily silly Serious Sam series of FPSs will be released in high definition for the Xbox 360 on March 4th.

Famous for their irreverent humour and preposterous enemies, the Serious Sam games first emerged in 2001, eschewing dark corridors for brightly-lit outdoor environments. This release will mark the first time that the games have appeared on UK retail shelves in all their HD glory. And let’s face it, if you’re going to blowing up a flock of busty harpies, you want to be doing it in high definition.

Serious Sam: The First Encounter is set mainly in Egypt and follows Sam “Serious” Stone as he sets out to foil the evil plans of an extraterrestrial overlord named (honestly) Mental. Serious Sam: The Second Encounter sees the time travelling hero head to Mesoamerica, Ancient Mesopotamia and Medieval Europe, splattering ridiculous enemies all over the landscape. This release will allow friends to share the squishy fun as it also features cooperative gameplay via online, network and split screen play.

Mastertronic’s Product Director Neil McKenna explained the wisdom of releasing the cult classic as a boxed version, saying:

“Serious Sam has been released on over five different formats over a 10-year period, most recently receiving a successful release via Xbox Live. With recent statistics showing two out of three gamers prefer to buy discs rather than download, and with over 14,000,000 XBOXes in Europe and the UK, there’s a huge potential market out there for this title.”

The HD release gives Serious Sam‘s technicolour environments a well-deserved polish. I didn’t realise it was possible to make headless bodybuilders look even more awesome, but it turns out I was wrong.

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