Following the critical and commercial success of its narrative-heavy adventure game
Heavy Rain, French development studio Quantic Dream is at work on two more projects, according to founder David Cage.
"After the success of
Heavy Rain, we continue to explore how we can go further with interactive drama," Cage said in
an Examiner interview.
Heavy Rain, a thriller with a branching narrative, released this February to strong reviews, and has sold more than a million units worldwide. Despite that, neither of Quantic Dream's upcoming projects seems to be a sequel. Rather, Cage implied the company would capitalize on the success of that new property to allow the company to keep making new games rather than sequels.
"After Heavy Rain, we have some credibility in experimenting with new IPs and new concepts," he said. "We are not going to play it safe from now. We are going to use this credibility to continue to take risks, give ourselves exciting challenges and try to invent new ways of playing."
The Paris-based independent studio's first game was the 1997 adventure
Omikron: The Nomad Soul, which it followed with 2005's
Fahrenheit (known as
Indigo Prophecy in North America). Before the release of
Fahrenheit, Quantic Dream said it was working on an
Omikron sequel and a new game called
Infraworld, the latter of which was later canceled.
While
Omikron 2 was never officially dropped, in 2008 Cage said the studio had
put it on hold to finish
Heavy Rain. He also said Quantic Dream was considering opening a second studio to work on two games simultaneously, but no further statements on that matter have emerged.
Despite those various clues, Cage's most recent updates point to entirely new games.
"I believe that this is what Quantic Dream’s fans expect us to do," he said. "It is also what keeps me passionate about what we are doing."
