14 DAY TRIAL // As we reported some time ago, Midway, the publisher of hit games like Mortal Kombat or Unreal Tournament, announced that it dropped several franchises in order to spend the little money it had left on other, more profitable titles. A lot of people began to wonder what titles Midway had given up on, and how severe the financial problems of the struggling company were.
Although it wasn't that obvious, Mark Rein, vice president of Epic Games, the developer behind Unreal Tournament 3, the latest in the very popular shooter franchise, recently spoke to Eurogamer and pointed out that UT3 hadn't been dropped by Midway. He added that his company even had plans with Midway to develop a “major expansion” for the game which would bring it back to the attention of gamers.
“Midway is still very much the publisher of Unreal Tournament 3. In fact, we're working together on a major expansion to Unreal Tournament 3, that we expect will excite and grow our UT3 customer base which, incidentally, now numbers over a million units sold-through world-wide.”
He revealed that the other title currently in development on which Epic Games is helping Midway, Wheelman, isn't in any danger of being dropped, on the contrary, the development cycle going very well. The company has finished implementing the Unreal Engine 3 into the game but the title has a long way to go until it gets launched in 2009.
It's really nice to hear that Unreal Tournament is one of the primary concerns for Epic Games as it is the title which put them on the map of shooter developers. The Gears of War franchise is more popular now, but older fans still think fondly of the hours spent playing Unreal Tournament.