Phil Spencer is pleased with how things are going with the development of the upcoming Xbox One exclusive shooter

Dec 5, 2014 08:31 GMT  ·  By

The head of Xbox, Phil Spencer, has said that Black Tusk Studios is making "massive progress" on the upcoming Gears of War video game, headed for the Xbox One sometime in the future.

The Microsoft-owned developer is apparently doing very well, according to Spencer, who met with the team in Vancouver.

Black Tusk Studios head Rod Fergusson has also expressed his enthusiasm regarding the meeting and the team's progress.

The Gears of War franchise was acquired by Microsoft at the beginning of the year, sparking hope for a new installment among the game's fanbase. Developed by Epic Games, the science-fiction third-person shooter turned out to be one of the Xbox 360's most popular games.

The series was designed by Cliff Bleszinski, who also worked on Epic's highly popular Unreal Tournament games. Bleszinski is currently working on Project BlueStreak, a free-to-play science-fiction arena shooter for PC.

Now, the Gears of War franchise is entirely in Microsoft and Black Tusk Studios' hands, who are toiling away to create a brand new entry in the series, one that will get back to the dark roots of the original games.

For the time being, there is no prospective release date for the Xbox One exclusive shooter, and although more news was promised earlier this year, it seems that we'll have to wait a while longer.

Many people expected Microsoft to make an announcement during this weekend's The Game Awards, but the company made it pretty clear that it had nothing planned for the show.

The next Gears of War is not a reboot

In an interview earlier this year, Spencer mentioned that the upcoming third-person shooter was not a reboot, because the series did not necessarily need that, but that it would instead recapture the darker tones of the earlier titles, bringing the series back on track.

The first three installments were pretty solid, but the fourth iteration, Judgment, was considered underwhelming, and Rod Fergusson, the producer of the original three games, has been called in to help achieve the desired continuity.

Consequently, the upcoming Xbox One Gears of War game will attempt to deliver the same grandeur and epic scale of events that the first game presented, especially since now that Microsoft owns the IP, Black Tusk Studios is free to do a lot more stuff with it and expand its breadth of content.

Fergusson mentioned earlier this year that making a new Gears of War game was challenging, as there were many rules and design methodologies to follow, but that Microsoft's support meant that the team could push a lot harder in many major areas, in order to make sure that the end result would be every bit as compelling as the series' debut.  

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