Prey developer Human Head has managed to survive the painful cancellation of Prey’s sequel, which Bethesda concluded at the time was ‘not good enough’.
Such a big project loss could have ended the studio, and ”needless to say we have our own perspective on the matter”, said business director Tim Gerritsen. Human Head turned to helping other studios.
They had a number of their staff assigned to Ken Levine’s lofty BioShock Infinite, while a small internal team worked on mobile free-to-play Fort Courage, and had enough devs to spare for Trion Worlds’ Defiance MMO. To keep the doors open they became a studio-for-hire.
Now they’re finally getting back to their own ambitions. Currently they’re working with Amazon Game Studios on a survival horror for mobile. ”It’s both a new and traditional title for us. New, in that it’s a big-scale mobile project,” said project director Chris Rhinehart.
“Human Head has created mobile projects in the past, such as Fort Courage, but Lost Within is a big budget mobile project with emphasis on quality controls for touch interfaces, high graphic fidelity, and a compelling narrative.”
“Even though it’s not a console or a PC title, it’s very much a Human Head game: dark, scary, and filled with unique gameplay and some exciting narrative moments.”
We may be in luck though as Human Head is also working on new things within the studio.
”Also very exciting are a series of new IPs we’re currently working on internally. I can’t get into specifics right now but all of these games are pushing boundaries in some way, whether it’s the interface or the game systems or the visual design. We’ll see what happens but I’m hopeful you’ll see more about these games publicly this year,” said project lead Norm Nazaroff.
”Human Head Studios has been a survivor over the years, and we’ve had to adapt as the industry changes. Old challenges have faded while new opportunities have arisen, and the ability to meet these new opportunities has been a key part of our longevity,” said Gerritsen.
“While we’re proud of our long and rich history in game development, Human Head Studios is even more excited about our future. We remain an intensely creative studio and seek to bring new visions to life regardless of the new directions the industry trends take us.”
Hopefully we’ll get to see and hear about these new projects this year, and that they’ll be for PC. Read the full interview between Human Head Studios and Develop for more.
[center]<iframe width="640" height="360" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/VhMUA_B5ozo?rel=0&showinfo=0" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen></iframe>[/center]
.jpg)