So in the realm of more or less speculation there are rumors floating out there that IO Interactive is in early development of a new IP revolving around a large fantasy RPG styled game with dragons! Codename Project: Dragon. And they have signed the project with XBOX. Seems to back up some of my previous posts regarding IOI speculation. Nice with some more details emerging.
So the new project has some indications of (Nothing is of cause 100% verified)
- Fantasy RPG with dragons and stuff!
- A large online game
- IO Interactive Malmö is the lead studio on the project.
- Signed with XBOX (possible exclusive!)
- In early development.. guessing they at least have a vertical slice that was good enough to sign with XBOX.
So that's pretty darn cool!
Looking forward to seeing if this is the case... but it will be years out before it will see the light of day. If it survives until then. Hopefully it does and it will be awesome!
So more speculation can spring from this info.. this is purely meta speculation! With a VERY low accuracy!
Based purely only on my own imagination.
One could ask what kind of game world they would be creating. Would it be the 'usual' high or low medieval fantasy setting. Or something new and fresh?!
And what would the gameplay be like.. could it be "Grand Theft Dragon" where you could jump mid air to land on a dragon to battle the rider in-flight PVP and take over the other dragon?!
Could it have large scale battles where you would swooping down and slashing armies with dragon fire and impact. Grabbing hold of squads of enemies, bombs, debris, catapults, horses and carriages and dropping them from a height. Perhaps to clear a way for the attacking army.
Could there be dragon taming? Finding/capturing dragon eggs for hatching and trading various types of dragons.
Really nice dragon IK animation that can procedurally climb uneven terrain and fortresses when not flying.
Oh yeah.. and feeding mechanics. The dragon should feed from time to time. On anything living.. other players, sheep, horses and the unfortunate peasant NPC.
Dragons should be upgradeable with armor plating etc.
It should be possible to fit a party of players/bots on top of a dragon. Eg. healers and ranged units. Could be like flying in a team of spec ops to complete a mission.
Also enemy armies should pose a certain threat to dragons with ranged units like (mobile) ballistas and archers.
That's probably some of the things I would do with a dragon game at least. Given the (ample) resources required.
- Small update: Something that would also make a lot of sense in a world with flyable dragons is... Floating castles! to really give the extra dimension of height and flying some meaning. Could also include very large flying creatures in the vein of Shadow of the Colossus. Perhaps even with structures and castles on their backs.
Hmmm so many questions and cool possibilities
Sources:
https://www.eurogamer.net/articles/2021 ... p-for-xbox
https://www.windowscentral.com/io-inter ... antasy-rpg