People Can Fly, the Polish developer responsible for Gears of War: Judgment and the cult-hit shooter Bulletstorm, has partnered with publisher Square Enix for the development of a new “high-end” game.
The project has not been described in great detail yet, but it will be available for both consoles and PC. The official announcement stated that Square Enix and People Can Fly will “work together to develop” the game, which suggests that one of Square Enix’ internal teams could also be involved in the project.
“We’re building a game we all want to play which will be the perfect addition to our portfolio,” said Square Enix London Studios’ head Lee Singleton.
The project will not be featured at E3 this year, and it still appears to be in its infancy — People Can Fly is currently hiring programmers and artists to bolster its team.
People Can Fly was previously a subsidiary of Epic Games, the studio behind the Unreal engine and the original Gears of War trilogy — the two studios co-developed Judgment. In 2015, People Can Fly regained its independence and took with it the rights to Bulletstorm. Gearbox Software recently published a remastered version titled Bulletstorm: Full Clip Edition for Xbox One, PlayStation 4, and PC. The new version includes better textures and audio, 4K support for PC and PS4 Pro, and smoother frame rates, and it’s bundled with all DLC content released for the original game. A Duke Nukem add-on is also available, for some reason.
Square Enix’ decision to partner with an outside studio on a project could be a sign of things to come. The publisher saw unexpectedly high sales for Nier: Automata, developed by PlatinumGames, and it recently announced the decision to part ways with IO Interactive following disappointing figures for Hitman. It’s unclear if development on the game’s second season will still continue.
