This week long-time game designer Eugene Jarvis (Robotron, Defender) confirmed his involvement in the creation of a new game from Finnish studio Housemarque during a panel discussion with other game creators (embedded above) held in Helsinki.
It's an interesting move in light of the fact that Jarvis already has his own (arcade) game studio: Raw Thrills.
His partnership with Housemarque marks the first time he's been involved in the design of a non-Raw Thrills game since 1994, though it's perhaps unsurprising in light of the clear inspiration Housemarque drew from his work on Defender while designing their PS4 launch game Resogun.
"When I saw Resogun I couldn’t believe how these Housemarque guys took Defender to a new level," stated Jarvis in a post on the Housemarque blog. "I wondered… what would happen if we teamed up? Mash up old school arcade with mad voxel tech and crazed nouveau Helsinki gamers… All I know now is that it is going to be explosive.”
Jarvis has never been shy about sharing his enthusiasm for classic arcade game design, and it's worth going back to watch his GDC 2014 postmortem of Robotron: 2084 for insight into how game development has changed since the days when arcades reigned.
For some startling insight into how little it's changed, consider his 2014 DICE Summit chat with fellow arcade game designer Mark Cerny about how modern free-to-play games mirror the design of classic quarter-munchers like Defender.