Inxile signs £3.5m deal for open-world VR RPG

Inxile Entertainment, developer of Wasteland 2 and its upcoming sequel, has announced a deal bringing £3.5 million of invstement for a new open-world, survival-centric role-playing game (RPG) specifically for virtual reality headsets.

Best known for having successfully brought back the Wasteland franchise that spawned the original Fallout, Inxile's Wasteland 2 was praised for its pandering to fans of the original while being soundly criticised for the same. The crowdfunded game proved successful enough that Inxile was able to begin work on a third entry in the franchise, to be again funded through crowdfunding, but the company seems only too aware that the market for traditional isometric role-playing games is limited - and has decided to hitch its wagon to the star of virtual reality via a £3.5 million deal with publisher Gumi.

'Gumi shares my passion for creating deeper virtual reality games and I'm fortunate to have a partner to work with in this spectacular new medium,' said Inxile chief executive Brian Fargo of the deal. 'We've had incredible feedback from our first game, The Mage's Tale, and we want to continue to build on our experience and reputation. I've always been fascinated by the social dynamics of the open world survival genre and experiencing that in virtual reality will create powerful and terrifying moments. We'll also be bringing our storytelling and RPG experience to the table to help enrich the genre.'

Released in late June, The Mage's Tale was Inxile's first attempt at bringing its role-playing chops to virtual reality. The deal with Gumi, though, will see a considerably larger game put together - a fully open-world RPG with a survival focus, rather than a dungeon crawler. 'Brian is a legend in the games industry, and Inxile Entertainment has a track record for creating ground-breaking PC and console games that feel AAA in scope and size using their creativity, ingenuity, and ambition, claimed Gumi chief executive Hironao Kunimitsu, who joins the board of Inxile as part of the deal. 'Over the past year, they've brought in very talented and experienced members as they shift their strategy from single player to multiplayer online games as a service, and we look forward to seeing how they approach the space.'

Neither Gumi nor Inxile have announced specifics relating to the game, but have promised it will 'launch on all platforms' rather than be exclusive to one particular VR headset.