UPDATE 14/09/2024: A statement provided to GamesIndustry.Biz clarifies that Ascendant isn’t just working with Absurd on a new project. In fact, “about 20 developers from the core team behind Immortals of Aveum” will form a new studio under Absurd Ventures called Absurd Marin.
Bret Robbins will lead this new team, and while it’ll begin with 20 people according to the same spokesperson it will build from there as the project necessitates.
The project being worked on is also something brand new – not one of the previous projects already underway with Absurd Ventures. GI.Biz identifies it as a “story-driven adventure title,” so it’ll be interesting to see what that ends up looking like.
It is curious though, as to why Robbins public remains vague on the actual details of the deal. The name “Absurd Marin” is nowhere to be found, and it leaves the idea that Ascendant will continue to exist in some form, though what that’ll be also remains vague.
Original Story:
Immortals Of Aveum developer Ascendant Studios is working on a brand new project with Absurd Ventures, the studio founded by Rockstar co-founder Dan Houser.
Announced by Ascendant’s chief executive officer Bret Robbins with a statement published to Twitter, Robbins says that the team is “joining forces” with Absurd Ventures on what he identifies as “a brand new project,” though doesn’t provide any other details.
This new project seems to be the sole-focus of Ascendant going forward now, as Robbins says that “the studio will be going quiet while the team transitions into our new project. We will be joining Absurd to begin prototyping and planning as we hit the ground running on the game’s development.”
While Immortals of Aveum was not able to stick the landing in terms of sales and its overall critical reception, one thing that everyone agreed on was that it looked good, and had some strong foundational qualities.
So it’s clear that Ascendant does have more than a few talented developers on its roster – or at least it did, since nearly half the team was laid off following Aveum’s poor launch.
The last we heard regarding Ascendant were reports saying that a “large portion” of the staff were furloughed, which is to say that they’re still staff members on paper, but are not owed any severance.
Hopefully those furloughed developers are now able to come back to work at Ascendant in full force on this new project, if they haven’t already found work elsewhere of course.
Whatever the case it’ll be interesting to see what this project becomes. Absurd Ventures is arguably the studio to watch more than most of the newly announced teams in the last few years.
Houser’s reputation as one of the original creatives behind the Grand Theft Auto games means that expectations are extremely high for what a new studio led by him can produce.
Absurd’s first two announced projects are not games, though more recently we saw a job listing confirm its first game will be some kind of open-world action-adventure. Perhaps that’s the game Ascendant is working on, or maybe it’s a totally new project all together.
Source – [Ascendant Studios]