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Marvel's Blade might have started development at the beginning of 2022.
That's according to incredibly eagle-eyed internet users, who are speculating that because Arkane Lyon campaign director Dana Nightingale listed her role as having started in January 2022 on her LinkedIn profile, that's when Marvel's Blade would also have begun development at Arkane Lyon.
(FYI) Marvel's Blade has been in development for nearly two years at Arkane Lyon According to the LinkedIn profile of Dana Nightingale Campaign Director for Marvel's Blade, development began in Jan 2022Source:https://t.co/wocgE4Tn4tCredit to @BethWilder26 for the find 👏 pic.twitter.com/ouR88zNFl7December 13, 2023
However, this might not entirely be the case. Arkane Lyon could very well have promoted Nightingale to the role of campaign director before work on Marvel's Blade began. Alternatively, this could be when conceptualization for the game started, and not full development.
On the other hand, January 2022 would be four months after Deathloop, Arkane Lyon's previous game, shipped on PS5. Assuming Nightingale had nothing to do with the port work for the shooter to Xbox consoles (a pretty safe bet), it's natural to assume the veteran developer would start work on the next Arkane game around this time.
Nightingale has been with Arkane Lyon for well over a decade at this point. She began as a level designer on the original Dishonored, as well as Dishonored 2, where she gained widespread acclaim for the latter's Clockwork Mansion level.
Deathloop saw Nightingale work as a campaign designer, and it's where she had the job of changing the game's entire campaign structure and flow near the tail end of development. Watch Nightingale's excellent talk just below from last year on how Deathloop's campaign tutorial proved particularly challenging.
As for Marvel's Blade, we don't know a whole lot about the new game, except for the fact that it's a third-person action game. With names like Nightingale and other Arkane Lyon veterans like Dinga Bakaba and Sebastien Mitton at the helm though, it's one we're looking forward to.
Read up on our new games 2023 guide for a look ahead to all the other games we've got to look forward to.
