Square Enix is said to be "heavily invested" in Project Athia according to an industry insider

Square Enix is said to be "heavily invested in its mysterious new title, Project Athia, according to industry insider Imran Khan.

Speaking in the latest episode of Kinda Funny Games (via resetera), Khan spoke about Square Enix's upcoming title Project Athia, and revealed some details about the studio's investment in the game.

"I think Sony knows what Square's internal prospects are for this game [Project Athia]", Khan says. "Square is very heavily invested in this. They want this to be the next big thing."

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Khan goes on to explain that Square Enix CEO Yosuke Matsuda is "really focusing on Athia," and that Sony is likely to "go hard on exclusivity and marketing for this game since it's "a big reveal and an important project" for Square Enix. Just recently in a video highlighting its new and upcoming PS5 games, Sony revealed that Athia will be a PS5 exclusive for at least two years, as well as launching on PC.

Project Athia is the working title for the game, and so far Square Enix hasn't divulged very much about it since its initial trailer reveal during the June PS5 showcase. It was so mysterious, in fact, that many began to speculate if it was in fact actually Final Fantasy 16. Khan even touches on this very subject.

"The one thing I will say about this game... This game was such a secret project for a long time that they were telling people to mislead them that it was Final Fantasy 16, which led to a lot of confusion where people thought it was going to be revealed as FF16, including me for a while."

So far, we know it's set to be an open-world action game, but we've only seen very brief glimpses of its world and protagonist. Interestingly, Khan claims that a "known celebrity" will feature in the game, with the only hint given being that "she was in Charlie's Angels". For now, all we can do is speculate about who that might be from the film, but many are already theorizing that it could be Ella Balinska - it's certainly a tantalising little teaser.

Keep track of everything on the horizon with our round-up of upcoming games 2020 and beyond.

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Heather Wald is the Evergreen Editor, Games at GamesRadar+. Her writing career began on a student-led magazine at Bath Spa University, where she earned a BA (Hons) in English literature. Heather landed her first role writing about tech and games for Stuff Magazine shortly after graduating with an MA in magazine journalism at Cardiff University. Now with almost seven years of experience working with GamesRadar+ on the features team, Heather helps to develop, maintain, and expand the evergreen features that exist on the site for games, as well as spearhead the Indie Spotlight series. You'll also see her contribute op-eds, interview-led features, and more. In her spare time, you'll likely find Heather tucking into RPGs and indie games, reading romance novels, and drinking lots of tea.