Outcast was so ahead of its time that temporality could barely make it out on the horizon. It had you explore open-world cities and forests in third-person, on foot or on mammals, two years before GTAIII. It exploited a voxel-ish engine, like that of the just-released Cube World alpha, to populate its tundra with effects – without recourse to newfangled 3D graphics cards.
Sadly, developers Appeal went bust while developing a sequel for the PS2. But now they’re back, clutching an asset purchase agreement signed by Atari.
Yann Robert, Franck Sauer and Yves Grolet, Appeal’s three founders, announced today that they have acquired Outcast’s IP from Atari Europe (not the wing that filed for bankruptcy in January, incidentally).
Appeal are planning a full-scale “revival of the franchise”. They’re keeping schtum on the details, but have promised to talk about the particulars of the agreement in the near future.
Until then, pass me those specula-goggles. I can’t imagine Atari have parted with rights to the royalties of the original game, which seems to do rather well on GOG.com. So what’s on the cards, do we think? A Kickstarted sequel?