The title shall be published by Epic Games.
In a round-up article from Famitsu that asked numerous notable Japanese developers their plans for 2023, legendary game designer Fumito Ueda stated, as translated by Gematsu, that his team over at studio genDesign was “working hard to be able to finally announce something, so please us your support.”
Technically, genDesign’s next project being in the works had already been announced. Back in 2020, Epic Games uploaded a video, which revealed that it was set to publish the studio’s future title. So, Ueda must be referring to actually announcing something about the game in 2023, as virtually nothing is known about it currently. Its mere existence, though, was enough to draw a lot of attention, as Ueda was the director of what is widely considered of the greatest and most impactful games of all time, Shadow of the Colossus.
Shadow of the Colossus first released in 2005, exclusively for the PlayStation 2. It was a PlayStation first-party title developed by Ueda’s prior team, Team Ico, a subdivision of Japan Studio, which was, in turn, a PlayStation-owned company. The game established itself as an immediate classic, going on to become a huge influence in the industry due to its near unprecedented sense of scale, both in its world and its enemies.
Ueda’s next game was 2016’s The Last Guardian, a PlayStation 4 exclusive. As you might have noticed, there’s an 11-year gap between these titles, and, no, Team Ico didn’t work on anything else in between. The Last Guardian revolves around interacting with a giant cat-like creature, whose dynamic behavior proved too technically complex for the PlayStation 3. The troubles were so bad that Ueda ended up leaving Japan Studio, and finishing the project externally with his new independent studio, genDesign.
It would end up being a smart departure, for Japan Studio was shut down by PlayStation in 2021, leaving only one team to carry on its legacy, Team Asobi, the studio known for its Astro Bot titles. The hope is that, for this new game, Ueda has been able to keep his ambitions reasonable, and thus finish the game in a more standard amount of time. Given that this will be published by Epic Games, it may be the first Ueda title that’s not a PlayStation exclusive (though don’t expect to see it on Steam).
