Artwork work reportedly taken from Free Radical Design’s unreleased TimeSplitters sport has popped up on-line.
As builders made redundant by the studio start to replace their on-line portfolios, followers are getting an inside peek on the untitled sport, together with idea artwork, character fashions, texture packs, weapon designs, devices, and extra.
The pictures – curated by The Vault: Free Radical Archive, a wiki that “strives to create an entire archive of knowledge on Free Radical Design’s next-generation cancelled titles” – are bittersweet for a lot of, notably because the destiny of the highly-anticipated sequel isn’t clear.
Artwork for the untitled TimeSplitters challenge that Free Radical Design had been engaged on has began to floor on the web due to former workers.
Credit: Will Brown, Elmo La Mantia, Callum Summers pic.twitter.com/5WFBfiVLcH
— TimeSplitters Information & Archives (@ts_archiv) December 16, 2023
Following this week’s rumours that Free Radical Design – the studio arrange in 2021 particularly to work on a brand new TimeSplitters sport – had been closed, studio proprietor Plaion (a subsidiary of the beleaguered Embracer Group) lastly made the information official.
Free Radical was based in 1999 by a lot of ex-Uncommon builders and shortly made a reputation for itself with the much-loved TimeSplitters FPS collection. In 2009, after a number of troublesome years, it was acquired by Crytek, turning into Crytek UK, who then bought it to Deep Silver in 2014, the place it turned Dambuster Studios – which made this yr’s Lifeless Island 2. Nevertheless, in Might 2021, Deep Silver introduced it was reviving the Free Radical identify and creating a brand new studio particularly to make extra TimeSplitters, with unique Free Radical co-founders Steve Ellis and David Doak on the helm.
“It is with a heavy coronary heart that we should announce yet one more troublesome resolution,” Plaion wrote in a press release. “At this time, we’ve to substantiate the official closure of Free Radical Design, and say goodbye to many exceptional, gifted and hard-working individuals.
“We’re past grateful for his or her unimaginable contributions to Plaion and want them one of the best of luck and success on their skilled journey from right here on out.”
As Tom summarised for us on the time, Free Radical is the newest studio to be impacted by Embracer Group’s devastating restructuring, which it initiated following the collapse of a $2bn deal earlier this yr. To this point, over 900 workers have misplaced their jobs throughout Embracer’s numerous studios and subsidiaries, with layoffs confirmed at Tomb Raider developer Crystal Dynamics, Insurgency studio New World Interactive, Pinball FX developer Zen Studios, Mythforce developer Beamdog, and extra.
Embracer has additionally shut down Studio Onoma (previously Sq. Enix Montréal) and Saints Row developer Volition, and is reportedly seeking to promote Borderlands studio Gearbox.