Original BioShock creator Ken Levine says he's not helping out with the development of BioShock 4 – or whatever the next game in the series ends up being called – and he's not sure if anyone would want that, anyway.
Speaking in an interview with content creator MrMattyPlays (below), Levine – who's now working on Judas at Ghost Story Games – is asked if he's offering any input on the next BioShock game, and if that's something he wants. The short answer is no, but the developer goes on to explain his feelings a bit further.
"It was much harder when BioShock 2 happened because I wanted to go in a different direction, and for a while it wasn't clear whether that was going to happen, and there was some disagreement there," he begins. "On this one, I decided that I didn't know what else I had to say in the BioShock front, and so I walked away from it.
"Part of that was not related to the franchise or the people, it was just that feeling I had the whole time, that I was competing against myself, and it made me wonder whether I want to do sequels anymore," he continues. "It is a strange thing. It can be really liberating but it also [can] be kind of a trap. So this time I, you know, with my blessing, I said 'please make something cool.'"
Levine notes that the BioShock team has "a lot of smart people," including head of franchise Rod Fergusson "who really helped us finish Infinite." But "no," he continues, "I haven't been involved."
Cloud Chamber – the studio working on the next BioShock game – and Judas developer Ghost Story Games are both ultimately owned by Take-Two Interactive, but Levine notes that the labels "don't really interact that much," adding that "we're almost like small little separate groups, and we help each other out where we can."
He continues: "I think the thing is, me just coming in and skydiving in and saying X, Y, and Z, that's not really how games are made. You know, you want to be there every day. You can have a great idea one day and the next day when you look into it further, turns out you're the biggest idiot in the world. So, I don't think you can come in like, 'oh, let's bring in Ken who's going to come in and punch things up,' or something. I don't think, even if anybody wanted that, which, you know, I don't know if they would, I don't think it works super well."
BioShock 4 is still shrouded in mystery – much of what's been said about it is rumor, and it's still not clear when we can expect it to release. Meanwhile, Judas was supposed to launch back in March this year, but it's been pushed back, and there's no further word on when it might actually come out.
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