No, it’s probably not another Obsidian-developed Fallout game. Sorry.
Awards ceremonies have changed a bit in recent times. Where once they were just about celebrating what’s gone before, they now serve to build excitement for upcoming projects, too.
Take Geoff Keighley’s The Game Awards. This year, the man himself is promising “more than 10” new games will be revealed during the ceremony and – in between larking about with Hideo Kojima – will be dropping teasers in the run-in to the event.
The first teaser is here, and it’s an exciting one.
Don't miss the global premiere and announcement of the upcoming RPG by @Obsidian and @PrivateDivision at @TheGameAwards streaming live everywhere next Thursday, December 6 at 9 PM ET / 6 PM PT. #WorldsWillChange pic.twitter.com/LjW8GmdwcB
— Geoff Keighley (@geoffkeighley) November 28, 2018
Obsidian – the venerable RPG developer who has just been purchased by Microsoft in their studio acquisition binge – has also been working with Take-Two’s new indie label, Private Division, on something as yet unknown.
But it’s going to become known very soon.
There’s currently a countdown on the Obsidian website that, coincidentally, runs out during the awards ceremony live stream for The Game Awards. But there’s more! There are also two – that we’ve seen thus far – pop-up ads on the Obsidian site that seem to be related to the new game.
The first is for a retro-futuristic sci-fi pistol called Spacer’s Choice.
The second is for a series of creams and ointments (and bread) that are “better than nature” from a brand called Auntie Cleo’s.
Now, given the vintage advertising postcard vibe and the laser pistol, you might think that Obsidian could be doing another Fallout: New Vegas. But they’re not.
— Obsidian (@Obsidian) October 16, 2018
It’s thought to be something of a sore point for Bethesda that Obsidian’s only Fallout game is better-regarded than Fallout 3, the game it shares its underpinnings with.
But that doesn’t mean that what Obsidian’s teasing isn’t really cool. The smart money would be on a Pillars-style RPG with a sci-fi bent, but given Take-Two’s involvement and the art style of the teaser images? We’re secretly hoping for an immersive sim.
Update, November 30th:
We’re now pretty certain that Obsidian’s latest tease is for something called Project Indiana.
It’s a Private Division project which has been mentioned in passing a couple of times in the past, and is associated with Obsidian’s Tim Cain and Leonard Boyarsky. We don’t know much more about Project Indiana than that, at the moment, so how are we so certain?
We saw something interesting in our analytics this morning. It’s a referral from Confluence, a collaboration tool that is often used by businesses and their marketing teams to keep track of any press coverage for their projects.
Specifically, it’s a referral from Obsidian’s private Confluence site, and the campaign it refers to? Is called “Project Indiana“.
We still don’t really know what Project Indiana is, of course – and it’s almost certainly a codename, not a final title – but all the signs point to that being Obsidian’s reveal at The Game Awards 2019.