GTA and Red Dead Redemption legendary creator is getting closer to a comeback. His ambitious open-world game already has a publisher
Dan Houser has teamed up with publisher Lost Ark, which will publish an AAA game by a new studio from one of the fathers of Rockstar Games.
Dan Houser found a publisher for his first game after parting ways with Rockstar Games.
The co-founder of the studio, to whom we owe the Grand Theft Auto series, left the team over 5.5 years ago, but he certainly didn't abandon the gaming industry. Since the end of 2023, there have been rumors about a new project by Houser. Moreover, since then, the Absurd Ventures team has remained very active, publishing podcasts, comics, and the audio series A Better Paradise. The action of the mysterious project of the studio is supposed to take place in the universe of this last one.
The question remained about the details of the game - and, of course, its publisher. Apparently, Houser and company have given up on self-publishing the project, as Absurd Ventures announced a collaboration with Smilegate (Lost Ark, Crossfire) to release the studio's first game (via LinkedIn).
Absurd Ventures was set up to tell new and different kinds of stories, and to create what I hope are interesting and compelling original experiences. This new game is an opportunity to go somewhere entirely different and to take players on an entirely new adventure. I am excited to be going on this journey with the amazing team that we are building here at Absurd Ventures, and am grateful that we are partnering with Smilegate who really understand and support our vision - said Dan Houser in the announcement about finding a publisher.
"Building" the team is far from over. A glance at the official Absurd Ventures website confirms that the developer is looking for many people to work on the game, including lead engineers. Nevertheless, Houser already has developers such as Michael Unsworth (one of the main scriptwriters of the Red Dead Redemption series), Greg Borrud (former studio manager at Niantic), and Jeffrey Crawford "Lazlow" Jones (former scriptwriter and creative director at Rockstar Games) on his team.
Besides them, the team was joined by veterans from renowned studios: Treyarch, Bungie Software, Respawn Entertainment, Riot Games, and Insomniac Games. The team therefore has experience in creating big games and doesn't hide its ambitions: Absurd Ventures wants to create a high-budget title with an open world, with an "ambitious and creative vision."
We have to wait until the dev shares the first information about the project. And hope that it will have a much better launch than the game of another GTA veteran.
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Author: Jacob Blazewicz
Graduated with a master's degree in Polish Studies from the University of Warsaw with a thesis dedicated to this very subject. Started his adventure with gamepressure.com in 2015, writing in the Newsroom and later also in the film and technology sections (also contributed to the Encyclopedia). Interested in video games (and not only video games) for years. He began with platform games and, to this day, remains a big fan of them (including Metroidvania). Also shows interest in card games (including paper), fighting games, soulslikes, and basically everything about games as such. Marvels at pixelated characters from games dating back to the time of the Game Boy (if not older).
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