Tue, Dec 07, 2010 | 11:59 GMT

Rumor: Raven Software developing stealth-based Bond game, taking focus off X-Men Origins sequel [Update]

bond

Tomorrow never dies. And neither does Bond.

Lord, that was a shitty movie.

According to a report from James Bond fan site MI6, one of Raven Software’s teams was hard at work on a stealth-centric James Bond title before MGM finally decided to stop ignoring the mountain of debt that’d been crushing it since 2005. In addition, Activision reallocated a bunch of Raven folks to work on Call of Duty map packs, rendering the stealthy Bond game effectively invisible for a time.

However, with MGM now plowing forward with its plan for profit through bankruptcy, Raven’s Bond game has been “taken off hiatus.”

Another Raven title – a sequel to X-Men Origins: Wolverine – is apparently still “on the backburner.”

Oh well, at least things are finally looking up, right? Er, not necessarily. Raven recently came a few steps closer to “nevermore” status after 20-40 employees were laid-off a couple months ago. Allegedly, the lay-offs were intended to re-focus the studio toward development of DLC. Now though, with at least one full-blown game running full steam ahead, the developer could be spreading itself a little thin. Here’s hoping its barren job listing page repopulates soon.

Update: Hello, Mr. footage of said Bond game that’s hidden away in a showreel of Raven animator Hanjin Song. How are we today?

There’s footage of unfinished work as well as gameplay footage from what seems to be the game running on a PS3 inbetween bouts of Singularity below. It all starts from 20 seconds in.

Thanks, GAF.

DemoReel 2010 by Hanjin Song from Hanjin Song on Vimeo.

25 comments

#1

Hunam
07/12/10, 1:02 am

I still think Raven have some great games left in them, lately they have just repeated their best bits from the late 90′s/early 00′s but they are still a top class developer. They just need to take risks.

#2

Anders
07/12/10, 1:07 am

High hopes. X-Men Origins: Wolverine was pretty damned good.

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07/12/10, 2:30 am

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#4

Maxey
07/12/10, 3:58 am

How about a Soldier of Fortune remake? I wish they released those games on Steam for 9 bucks each.

#5

triggerhappy686
07/12/10, 7:17 am

I would LOVE for this to be true. I think Bond and stealth would fit each other nicely. Im not a big fan of Raven but some of their games are decent.

#6

onlineatron
07/12/10, 9:52 am

So they’ll make the Bond game and then be shut down by Activision?

#7

Gheritt White
07/12/10, 10:23 am

HERETIC 3!!

#8

pukem0n
07/12/10, 12:08 pm

thats where splinter cell conviction got all their ideas.
even the smash someone into a toilet scene ^^

#9

Razor
07/12/10, 12:11 pm

Tomorrow Never Dies was a great film.

Nathan doesn’t know what he’s talking about :P

#10

Anders
07/12/10, 12:23 pm

Looks pretty nice.

#11

Alakratt
07/12/10, 12:26 pm

Jesus Christ!!! That looks kick-ass!! IMO Bloodstone is great! I like it the way it is, but if they added the option of stealth, like finishing a whole mission hidden, would’ve been really cool too. But I’m really looking forward to this Bond too.

#12

KrazyKraut
07/12/10, 1:03 pm

Singularity was very good. I love the game. Its sad it had such poor sale numbers :( (((((((( *insert ultimate sad face here*

#13

onlineatron
07/12/10, 1:11 pm

So basically they were going to create the Splinter Cell Conviction clone that Bloodstone was anyway?

(albeit a better looking one.)

#14

Erthazus
07/12/10, 2:10 pm

Singularity and Bloodstone were absolute crap.

Singularity was a cheap Bioshock Rip Off
Blood Stone was a mess on the every level. There is absolutely nothing positive: Bad story, cheap piece of racing from Blur, cheap shooting mechanics Everything is just blargh.

I don’t know who can be excited about these games. Only people who started playing this generation. Not only these games had poor sales, they had poor reviews from reviewers and general consumer.

#15

Anders
07/12/10, 2:20 pm

I won’t try to defend Bloodstone, but Singularity was one of the best games this year. As for the “Bioshock Rip Off” goes, both games were first person shooters, both were built on UE3 and both were incredibly atmospheric. That’s about it.

Also, I wouldn’t call an average score of 77 percent poor.

#16

Erthazus
07/12/10, 2:27 pm

@15, Bioshock looked better, it was done better. Story was also better. Design of the locations does not look like something from Russia. Something in the middle of the RED ALERT (comedy) and STALKER. With Red flags and stupid signs that has nothing to do with it.
Story in Singularity was predictable and boring. It was about: Mad scientist that wanted to rule all over the world, but there is another one scientist that is… Good and need to stop another one. Of course, how original.
Bioshock textures by far looks better and general look is better. If they were made on the same engine, that does not makes automatically Singularity look good.

Basically.. Singularity is WOLFENSTEIN 1.5. Same shit. If you never played it, well grats, because it’s the same game. SAME shitty game just with Bioshock taste. WOLFENSTEIN 2009 is also a bad game.

“Also, I wouldn’t call an average score of 77 percent poor.”

For metacritic these days. This is a bad game.
+ it was not even sold for 1 million.

#17

Johnny Cullen
07/12/10, 2:29 pm

Singularity looks pretty good. I still need to pick it up, so I’m going to when it gets cheaper. But not this year anyways, I have a massive backlog as it is.

#18

Anders
07/12/10, 2:36 pm

I didn’t say that Singularity was better than Bioshock; it isn’t – every aspect of Bioshock is superior to Singularity. What I’m saying is that Singularity isn’t, as you put it, “absolute crap”.

And I did play Wolfenstein. While I can see the parallells between the titles – both are first persons shooters, both delve into science fiction – Wolfenstein has neither appealing atmosphere nor interesting gameplay mechanics, which were the strong points of Singularity.

#19

AHA-Lambda
07/12/10, 3:06 pm

singularity was decent. Very strong start to it but the rest of the game didn’t follow through on that.

A bond stealth game would be cool, plus we don’t need acti closing mroe studios after all.

#20

KrazyKraut
07/12/10, 4:19 pm

@Tro..eh…Erthazus
yeah..maybe, but BS just set a trend and Singularity followed it.
Singularity was cool, ofc not so awesome as BS, but is was cool. I liked how they had their own ideas…and the story was nice too.

I think you are not a real gamer…hating this game and trolling about this..wtf is wrong with you? Btw…you are such a casual gamer, liking only AAAA and big name titles.

Its sometimes only about gameplay and fun…and Singularity had it.

#21

Erthazus
07/12/10, 4:26 pm

“Btw…you are such a casual gamer, liking only AAAA and big name titles.”

Some granny told you that?

“and the story was nice too”

About mad scientist that wanted to take all over the world and that in the end need to be stopped?
you know, have you ever played more than 15 games in your life? Or maybe books?

“hating this game and trolling about this..wtf is wrong with you?”

Butthurted much?

“Its sometimes only about gameplay and fun…and Singularity had it.”

Every game out there have gameplay. It’s a SHOCK for you i know, right?

@AHA
“singularity was decent. Very strong start to it but the rest of the game didn’t follow through on that.”

Exactly. First 20 minutes of the game until we will find a first decent gun. Everything else is just repetitive.

#22

Gekidami
07/12/10, 4:27 pm

#23

guapo
07/12/10, 4:31 pm

I don’t think erthazus has played either of the games he commented about in post 14. I think this guy reads some reviews and formulates opinions without experiencing the actual games, which is a shame because he’s bound to miss some worthwhile (though not glowingly-reviewed) titles. A review is nothing more than an opinion, and metacritic is just a compilation of opinions, not the final word on game quality. Before you talk bad about anything in life have some first-hand knowledge.

#24

KrazyKraut
07/12/10, 5:09 pm

@guapo
yeah looks like…

Erthazus you should really read the stuff you write..I was friendly…offensive, but friendly.

btw trolly:
http://www.gametrailers.com/users/Erthazus/gamepad/

nough said…

#25

DSB
07/12/10, 5:30 pm

I’d be inclined to pick up Singularity if it goes on sale, but the term “average shooter” was thrown around a lot, and that’s a pretty huge turnoff for me.

@24 Geeze, the Netflix comment in that link is priceless. Netflix has become one of the worlds largest rental and VoD services in a little over a decade. There are billions and billions of dollars being invested in businesses like that as a result. So yeah, definitely a total failure.

Not to mention the fact that he doesn’t live in the US, which pretty much means he hasn’t tried the service and doesn’t have a clue. But then that goes for a lot of things.

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