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Scribblenauts Developer 5th Cell Announces New Game
Developer 5th Cell is known for inventive, kid-friendly handheld games like Drawn to Life and Scribblenauts. So, when the company added a countdown timer to its website, many speculated that a new game announcement was forthcoming. Today, the studio has revealed a new project – and it’s quite a surprise. Created for Xbox Live Arcade and running on Valve’s Source engine, the third-person shooter Hybrid is far from the colorful, cartoonish work that we’ve come to expect from 5th Cell.
Set it what appears to be a post-apocalyptic world, the game centers on two warring factions: the Paladins (possibly human characters) and the Variants (who we assume are the alien-looking creatures in the bottom right of the concept art above). While little is known about the game, 5th Cell’s page for the game says, “Hybrid is a pioneering third person shooter set in a devastated post apocalyptic world, giving players a completely new gameplay experience never seen before in the genre.” Later, it dubs Hybrid a “a ground-breaking evolution to the third-person shooter genre.”
So, there will be guns. The Hybrid official site also leaves some hints as to the game’s plot, with the prominent tagline “Choose this day whom you will serve” featured above a menu where you can select Paladin or Variant. Both of the links take you to a teaser trailer of the game, and also contain links to two journal entries, presumably written from the Paladin and Variant point of view. We’ve included screen grabs of the journal entries below.
The trailer is ominous in tone. As a camera pans through a destroyed bank vault, the narrator intones, “When I was little my father used to say, 'Son, God didn’t create money – man did. God didn’t create war – man did. God didn’t create hell – the Variants did.'" Coming out of the bank vault we see a human (or humanoid) space soldier taking cover. Suddenly, one of the alien life forms pops out of the background, and a battle ensues – after which the trailer ends.
Stay tuned for more information on what should be one of the most anticipated XBLA games in quite some time.
Journal Entries:
Screen Grab from Trailer:
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