Civilization Online announced, is an MMO for the Asian market

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Civilization Online is a clever bit of brand expansion from publisher and Firaxis owners Take-Two, but it’s also a new Civilization game – something we’re always very interested to hear about by default. It’s being developed by South Korean developers XLGAMES, the studio of Lineage creator and Eastern MMO king Jake Song.

It’s being built “from the ground up” by a 100-strong team in Seoul. Details are scant so far, aside from a sizeable chunk of Take-Two marketing gobbledygook. Let’s try and parse it together.

“Making our intellectual property available to delight consumers wherever they are is an important component of our long-term growth strategy,” said Strauss Zelnick, chairman and CEO of Take-Two.

“The consumer response for NBA 2K All Stars and NBA 2K Online has been very encouraging. With the upcoming releases of Pro Baseball 2K and Civilization Online, Take-Two is uniquely positioned to delight gamers throughout Asia,” added Hubert Larenaudie, president of Take-Two Asia.

So there’s a Civ Online happening, but we’re not getting it. It’ll be designed specifically for the East Asian market – one perceived by Western publishers to be entirely different to their own, and increasingly treated as such.

That’s not to say that we’ll never see Civ Online in Europe or the US, mind. The series’ asynchronous multiplayer has remains consistently popular over the years, while Crysis’ Warface is steadily making its way west as we speak.

Still: how exactly would a Civ MMO play? Set phasers to speculate.

Thanks, VG247.