The team behind the popular open-world game, The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt , has announced that they are suspending their latest project in order to work on a new one. Fans of the series have noticed changes with previous installments and don’t seem too pleased by what’s going on.
Frogwares, the studio behind Sherlock Holmes: Chapter One and The Sinking City, has launched Project Palianytsia, a brand-new video game. Due to the impact of the Ukraine conflict on the studio’s daily operations, Frogwares has stated that production on their next open-world project has been halted in order to focus on something new and more streamlined. The team has only revealed the working title and a few concept art pieces for the game so far.
The company plans to make an official announcement in a few months, with a complete release in the summer of 2022. Project Palianytsia is the name of Frogwares’ latest game, which is a blend of eldritch horror and Victorian-era mystery. Because the game is targeted at lovers of The Sinking City and the Sherlock Holmes series, we may anticipate certain investigative mechanics in the new project. To begin, the company has published four early concept art pieces to offer us a taste of their next project.
Frogwares Communications Manager Sergey Oganesyan published a comprehensive statement outlining the necessity for such a project, which we’ve included below:
The conflict continues. We feel the same way. A new game is being developed.
The Russian invasion has already entered its fourth month. This so-called “special operation” was expected to be completed in a matter of days. It’s funny how life doesn’t always go as planned. Whatever Russian troops hurl at us, we have no doubt that Ukraine will remain an independent country. However, due to the conflict, we must adapt. And the job has to go on. With that, we’d like to make an announcement.
We can now publicly announce that we’re working on a new game called “Palianytsia.” Fans of The Sinking City and Sherlock Holmes should enjoy this horror and mystery adventure. We’ll make a formal announcement shortly, but for now, we’d like to share some early concept art with you.
To be honest, “Palianytsia” was not the project we had intended on undertaking next, but with the war looming, we had to reconsider our plans. It’s a little more streamlined than our other open-world games, but it’s a game we’re certain we’ll be able to create under these tough conditions.
To be able to release our games as an independent company, we must constantly balance our resources and process. However, the conflict has created significant obstacles for us and our established procedure. We need a project where workers can have greater autonomy since constant contact and iteration across teams is difficult to sustain. To fill the voids created by individuals who joined up to fight or offer humanitarian relief, roles and duties had to adapt. And the possibility that something unexpected may happen someplace or to someone tomorrow, forcing us to significantly change all over again, implies we must be more adaptable. With this in mind, we had to make a choice.
Do we go ahead with a large scope project and risk disruption, have less room for R&D and innovation, less access to your highly skilled staff, and have smaller pre-production and development of specific tools? Or perhaps we can be smarter about this, and create a project with an easier turnaround and a tighter scope – but still ambitious, packed with quality, and with great storytelling and mystery behind it. This way, we can not only make a new game, but do so while supporting those fighting.
We’ll be providing more information about our upcoming title soon. We’d also want to provide you a more thorough peek at our life and work during a conflict if you’re interested. Perhaps it will bring you and us closer together. We’re also exploring at additional methods to deliver the game straight to you — stay tuned for more information on that.
Thank you for all of your help at this difficult time. Keep yourself secure wherever you are.
– Frogwares Design Team
Frogwares Communications Manager Sergey Oganesyan added:
We’re publishing the game now to show people that we’re still going forward, as well as to send a clear message to those who think they can just walk into our nation and disturb and damage our lives.”
Prior to this, everything we issued during the war was existing projects that needed to be finished, which was still difficult. We’re now developing something nearly totally from scratch, which is far more difficult under these circumstances, so we had to think carefully about what was feasible. Because it is something our present team and structure can achieve, rather than undertaking pre-production on another open-world project, which is what we were planning before to the conflict, the concept was approved.
Palianytsia is a symbolic term for Ukraine since it is a component of our national cuisine. However, for Russians who are attempting to pass themselves off as Ukrainian, it is the equivalent of phonetical Dark Souls. As a result, it’s now often utilized in the field as a test to swiftly determine unknown persons’ likely allegiance.
Frogwares will publish more information on Project Palianytsia in the following months.
