Chris Roberts returns to gaming industry, new project for PC already in the works

By: Jason McCarthy

  |   October 2nd, 2012   |  

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Wing Commander and Freelancer creator Chris Roberts may have taken some time off from making video games, but he is all set to make his return to the most powerful gaming platform with his latest project, the name of which still remains a mystery.

After giving gamers two blockbusters, Roberts had turned his attention to Hollywood, producing films that included Lord of War and The Punisher.

He had indeed left a void in the gaming industry for a long time, but now the vacation is over and he is returning back to business.

In a recent interview with GameSpot, Roberts revealed that one of the main reasons for him to be drawn back to the gaming industry was the amount of technology advancement that has taken place over the years.

According to him, the high-end technology available today is just what he desired to bring his creative ideas to life.

“A couple years ago, I came to the point where I was playing stuff and I was feeling like the technology was getting to the point where I could do some stuff that I was interested in again. The level of immersion and realism that you can do [today] is significantly higher,” Roberts said.

Roberts conceded that he is looking to push the visual and performance capabilities of PC to its limit with his new project, which would be slightly ahead of what the high-end consoles of Microsoft and Sony would be capable of offering.

“I want to get back to the roots of what I did in the old days with Wing Commander, which was, if you’ve got a really badass PC, this is going to show it off,” he said.

Despite staying out of the gaming industry for over a decade, the developer is pretty much informed of the various changes that have taken place and how the industry has evolved. As a result, he feels pretty comfortable and confident about both his return as well as his latest project.

Commenting on the publishers, Roberts said that he is quite aware of how their psyche has changed over the years. He contended that they had become more willing to spend large amount of money on a game rather than investing less than in more projects as they wanted the game to be nothing short of perfect.

He further added that they had become more risk-averse, supporting well-established brands instead of becoming a bit adventurous.

Coming back to his own project, Roberts conceded that he has no plans of forming a publishing partnership with Electronic Arts (EA) or Activision. Instead, he has opted for private funding of the project.

The fans of Freelancer and Wing Commander will surely be celebrating the return of Roberts and have high expectations off his latest project, which appears to be a space combat simulator.