Splinter Cell: Conviction Still in Development

There has been a lot of speculation lately on the subject of Splinter Cell: Conviction, the Sam Fisher-focused game that was supposed to come out in late 2007, after Ubisoft first talked about it back in 2006. Not only did the game not launch as predicted, but also no news has come from the French videogame company regarding the project. At one point, there were even rumors that the game, which looked too much like Assassin's Creed and Metal Gear Solid 4: Guns of the Patriots, was getting a radical re-design.

Even as Ubidays, an event where Ubisoft showcases its biggest projects, dragged on, no one seemed to want to talk about Conviction. But Eurogamer managed to get a hold of Christine Burgess-Overmard, who is leading development on the title, and to extract some information regarding the future of super spy Sam Fisher.

Christine Burgess-Overmard has launched into the vaguely familiar discourse of "more polish," saying that the game is still in development and that a full team is working on it at Ubisoft. She said that, because "Splinter Cell is one of our major IPs," Ubisoft is very careful about what it is showing of the project. They prefer to wait rather than to present something unfinished to the general public. Christine Burgess-Overmard admitted that "it's not yet perfect," but said that a new game in the Splinter Cell series is definitely coming out. However, the time frame is still unknown, with "when it's ready" being the estimated release date.

The initial Splinter Cell: Conviction concept was that of a stealth game where crowds would be essential for the survival of the player. Sam Fisher would have had none of the high tech gadgets that the series equipped him with thus far, having to rely on his own skills to keep himself alive while unraveling another plot that threatened the stability of the free world.