A group of games
developers formerly attached to the fan-favourite studio Rare have
stepped out on their own. The newly formed Playtonic Games
is off to a strong start, teasing a spiritual successor to
action-platformer Banjo-Kazooie as
its first title.
In witty fashion, and with a dash of classic British
self-deprecation, the studio introduces itself with "Playtonic's
the name, and fun games, unique characters and
absolutely-frickin-amazing worlds to explore are our game. Or at
least they will be, once we eventually get around to releasing our
first project instead of faffing around on WordPress."
Currently referred to as "Project Ukelele", that secret first
title has only had one piece of concept art released so far,
showing two pairs of eyes glaring out from an umbral forest. The
eyes are similar -- though not exactly identical -- to those of the
title characters from the 1998 classic, originally released for the
N64.
The Leicestershire-based Rare was once closely associated with
Nintendo, developing
beloved titles such as Donkey Kong Country, Diddy Kong
Racing, and GoldenEye 007. It was bought by Microsoft in 2002,
becoming a first-party developer for Xbox games. With the shifts in
the studio's operation structure in the years that followed,
several of the key staff from the Nintendo era departed.
Don't
miss
Plans for Playtonic have long been in the works. The team make
wry reference to their founding in 2012 "after drinking too many
shandies in the pub", and their Twitter
account has existed since then. Currently formed of six
members -- project director Chris
Sutherland (formerly of Viva Piñata and the
Banjo games), technical director Jens Restemeier, game
creator Mark Stevenson, character art director Steve Mayles,
environment art director Steven Hurst, and developer Gavin Price --
they hope to grow to around 15 staff.
While copyright prevents the new business from using the exact
Banjo-Kazooie IP (unless, in some yet to be revealed
twist, Playtonic has struck a deal with Microsoft to use the
bird-bear duo) the team says the end result will be "a worthy
spiritual successor to those fondly remembered platforming
adventures we built in the past."
Whatever Project Ukelele matures into, Playtonic warns that it's
only at an early stage of development at present, with more to be
revealed over the coming months.
Source Article from http://www.wired.co.uk/news/archive/2015-02/11/new-studio-ex-rare-devs http://cdni.wired.co.uk/620x413/o_r/Playtonic.jpg
Playtonic Games studio created by former Rare developers
No comments:
Post a Comment