14 DAY TRIAL // Codemasters have some ambitious plans regarding the game development, preparing a release for a brand new, original IP from the recently opened Codemasters Guildford. The mysterious game that's in the works, codenamed "Project Strike Team" will be a "character-driven action title" scheduled for release in 2009.
In an interview with Develop, Aidrian Bolton, head of the Guildford studio, declared: "There are some rumblings and speculation in the industry already about what exactly we're making. People are excited to try something genuinely new", he added fuel on the fire about the new IP.
However, there was no very clear information about the Project Strike Team. But Bolton is not a new name in the game development area - he was the former development director of Criterion Game, which proves that there is some talent working for this new title drawn up by Codemasters. Still, the finer points of its design are to be bashed out by the Guildford team.
"A lot has already been done on the groundwork, but I think that's a great benefit for the new team - they can now come in with some set parameters but start adding to it in their own way", Bolton said, assuring people that this game won't be some kind of GTA clone.
The game will be developed using the Codemasters' internal technology called EGO (first known as Neon), the same that was used for Colin McRae DIRT and will be used by Race Driver GRID and Operation Flashpoint 2. This and the fact that Codemasters wants to create shared technology for the next-gen systems were the reasons Aidrian Bolton accepted to work on the new title - as he says, it's a great challenge:
"There's plenty of reasons why you shouldn't, because there are pressures to just get things done and out the door. Everyone in theory likes the idea, but in the practice, in the blood sweat and tears you just think 'we've just got to get the game finished' and the idea goes out the window."
Hopefully, Guildford, Codemasters or Aidrian Bolton will soon become more talkative and will give us what we want most: some screenshots or, at least, more clear information regarding Project Strike Team. All of this because waiting until the release in 2009 simply doesn't sound right.