A brand-new studio formed of ex-Volition developers is working on a new Xbox exclusive game for Series consoles and PC. Consisting of Saints Row and Red Faction developers, the new Shapeshifter Games may be one to watch.
While the most recent Saints Row game didn’t meet anyone’s expectations, the sadly-deceased Volition was a standout games studio for decades. With the formation of Shapeshifter, the studio has the potential to try again.
“Founded by veteran developers from Volition, Shapeshifter Games was created to partner with world class developers and publishers on the creation of AAA games,” reads the studio’s mission statement.
In multiple job listings for openings at the studio, it’s revealed that the team is working on a new Xbox Game Studios project in Unreal Engine 5. The openings also detail some possible gameplay features that could make their way into the very early in-development Xbox game.
For example, the job listing for Lead Engineer asks for knowledge of making traversal systems, combat systems, mission systems, narrative systems and — most interestingly — inventories and crafting mechanics.
“Shapeshifter draws upon deep experience in open-world and character action games earned while working on some of the industry’s most beloved franchises,” reads another passage on the studio’s website.
As for the studio’s link to Xbox, principal lighting artist at Shapeshifter, AJ Nelson, revealed the link on LinkedIn. In the developer’s most recent career update, spotted by Klobrille, it reads: “co-developing an Xbox Game Studios project.”
For the time being, it seems that Shapeshifter Games is a contract studio assisting with new games — a very frequent practice in the industry. With the studio’s history of stellar open world projects, and the use of Unreal Engine, we could see the team working on the next Gears of War game. That’s if primary developer The Coalition is continuing the open-ended levels of Gears 5.
Then again, the studio could be working on something completely new, maybe a new Crackdown game! A good Crackdown sequel, wouldn’t that be awesome?