14 DAY TRIAL // One of the most surprising announcements of the year has been the move of the Gears of War franchise from the original development team at Epic Games to Black Tusk studio, which is tasked by Microsoft with delivering a new title for the Xbox One.
Rod Fergusson is one of the developers who has worked on the series for a long time, and his new position as studio manager of the new studio means that he will have an important role in its future.
He tells Polygon that the universe created by Epic Games has a lot of lore that can be explored in a coming experience, although he refused to offer details about which period his team is currently focused on.
He states, “That's what I like about Gears of War games is, it tends to be a very constricted moment in time for the characters. It's like an episode of 24 to me. We're not 'let's go talk about three years in the life of this character.' It's about what happens over this two-day period, and so there's things.”
The game creator mentions Emergence Day and the Pendulum Wars as the most fertile areas of the franchise, but he also seems to imply that a final decision has not yet been made inside Black Tusk.
Rod Fergusson also explains that he has returned to the Gears of War series, after spending some time helping the now extinct Irrational Games to put the finishing touches on BioShock Infinite, because he likes the core concepts of the series and the process associated with creating titles for it.
He adds, “Once I found out that Black Tusk had Gears, it was a no-brainer. This literally is my dream job. If I were to sit down, if you were to say, ‘Here's a piece of paper; write the perfect job description for yourself,’ and I literally would be writing what I'm doing today. It's just crazy.”
Epic Games has said that its current focus on Unreal Engine 4 did not give the team enough time to deliver a solid installment in the Gears of War series.
Microsoft has not offered any sort of hint about the coming video game that Black Tusk is working on, but has suggested that it will be one of the experiences that will test the limits of the Xbox One home console.
The title’s launch will probably take place at some point in 2016.