Cliff Bleszinski had previously said he was done the video game industry, but now we know where he'll be trying his hand next. The man behind Gears of Water recently revealed he's producing on Broadway.

Even Cliff Bleszinski noted how crazy it was after making a tweet about over on his official Twitter account. He proudly declared that he was co-producing a Broadway show called HadesTown. After pointing to the Broadway show on Spotify, he later clarifies how he got into the whole stage show business far and away from gaming, stating that it was his niece who was a Broadway nerd that first introduced him to it. Following that thread, Bleszinski decided to get into the production aspects of it. He also points out that while he states that he's co-producing the show, he's actually more of an investor, since he joined the production team as an investor not as a producer, but he's still technically co-producing the show.

He's definitely right that a lot of people in the gaming news are definitely going "WTF?".

It was just earlier in the year that Boss Key Productions was still working on video games, specifically a hipster Battle Royale game called Radical Heights, where instead of having fatigues and military vehicles at your disposal, you rode around on bikes, and donned skater clothes while taking down opponents in a colorful and vibrant battle arena.

Despite the popularity of Radical Heights with some, the game just didn't do well enough to justify keeping the doors open at Boss Key Productions, the outfit that Cliff Bleszinski opened up to work on games independently and away from the strict structures of AAA publishers.

The company's first project was LawBreakers, a multiplatform first-person shooter that was themed around anti-gravity combat. It didn't fare quite so well on the market, especially as it faced stiff competition from other combat arena shooters such as Unreal Tournament and Quake Champions, as well as Blizzard's own Overwatch.

The closure of Boss Key Productions came just a short year after the launch of LawBreakers, which launched in the middle of August for the PlayStation 4 and PC.

After Boss Key Productions closed up shop, Cliff Bleszinski sent out tweets stating that he would be leaving gaming for good. He declared himself done with the world of development, and it appears he's sticking to his word. The creator of Jazz Jackrabbit and Gears of War is now testing his mettle in the world of Broadway, and we'll see how this all pays off as his investment into HadesTown begins to ramp up. Previews for the show begin on March 22nd, 2019 next year. After that, we'll find out if Bleszinski has what it takes to break a leg on Broadway.

After decades of making some of the biggest games in the industry, Cliff Bleszinski has announced that he plans to step away from development for good in order to spend his time with friends and family. Now, he's gone into more detail about why he's made that decision. In a recent post, Bleszinski said...

The above comes from a statement Cliffy B. posted to Facebook. He took to social media recently saying that he was stepping away from the games industry and, based on this follow-up, it sounds like he's planning on making it a permanent move. Not a lot of game developers are as well known by the industry as Bleszinski, which is why this news is likely hitting folks so hard.

Bleszinski started in the games industry nearly 30 years ago, making his first round of major noise courtesy of Unreal Tournament in 1999. He eventually went on to spearhead the Gears of War series, which is when he became a household name for the games community.

Stepping away from Epic, Bleszinski went on to form his own studio, Boss Key Productions. His first game was an inventive arena shooter called LawBreakers, which hit the scene with a resounding flop. The game was actually a hell of a lot of fun, but Overwatch was really hitting its stride when LawBreakers launched, and PUBG was sucking all remaining oxygen out of the room at that time.

To try and keep the company afloat, Boss Key went on to create its own battle royale game, Radical Heights. That game launched in super early access but, while it was showing some promise, it never really caught hold. Fortnite had taken over the world by the time Radical Heights was being introduced so, again, Bleszinski's game never really stood a chance.

Through all of that, Bleszinski became even more familiar with the inner workings of the industry and, as he states in his comments, it's just not a life he wants for himself.

As we've seen in recent months, publishers have some insane expectations for games with massive sales for games like Destiny 2: Forsaken and Black Ops 4 still not enough to impress investors. Combine that with months upon months of hard work and uncertainty for a project that might not even find an audience and it's easy to understand why Bleszinski has decided to step away. As he also notes in his statement, he's good friends with a lot of folks in the business and, as best he can tell, things don't seem to really get better, even for those who find success.

Cliff Bleszinski is best known for helping Microsoft dominate over Sony during the seventh generation of gaming with the Gears of War trilogy while he was working at Epic Games. The evolution of the Unreal Engine had direct synergy with the gameplay and tech advancements featured in Gears of War, which made it both popular as a game and as a showcase for evolutionary software tech. It quickly made Bleszinski a millionaire since it attracted a very targeted demographic who loved the series. Well, that's all coming to an end since he's apparently done making games, as he revealed in the below post:

In a tweet reply on his official Twitter account, Bleszinski, best known in the gaming world as Cliffy B., responded to a gamer who was asking for a refund of Lawbreakers since the game is no longer supported following the closure of Boss Key Productions, Bleszinski's production company. The game originally came out in 2017 and shut down a year later in 2018.

The long-time developer responded by saying that he had to pay for everyone's salary, 401K and health care first, even after the studio folded, and that he hadn't taken a salary for himself for two years.

In the tweet, Bleszinski states that he's done with making games and never making another game. This was further reiterated and confirmed by GamesIndustry.biz, who reached out to Bleszinski to confirm if the claims were true, and he responded by stating "I'm done."

This wouldn't be the first time that Bleszinski called it quits on gaming. Following his tenure at Epic Games working on the Gears of War trilogy, Bleszinski also called it quits after shipping the Xbox 360 exclusives in 2012. However, just three years later in 2015, Bleszinski was back at it and he decided to scratch that itch to create something new. That something new turned out to be Lawbreakers for PC and PlayStation 4. The first-person shooter was an anti-gravity PvP game with a theme based around the hero-shooter gimmick where each character had their own personality, abilities and weapons.

However, the market had already had its champions cornering the hero-shooter gimmick, with Team Fortress 2 leading the charge and Overwatch not being far behind. Much like Gearbox Software's Battleborn, which was another hero-shooter that came out around the same time as Overwatch.

None of the other hero-shooters seemed to fare all that well either other than Overwatch in recent times. Sadly Lawbreakers was one of those games that just did not do well on the market.

Boss Key Productions attempted one final outing before closing up shop and tried its hand at Radical Heights, but even though the game managed to capture a solid audience in the Battle Royale genre, it was too little too late.

After having to shut down Boss Key Productions and closing up Radical Heights and Lawbreakers, and having to deal with the backlash from the community, Bleszinski decided to finally hang up the gloves and step out of the ring of gaming.

While the closure of Boss Key Productions means that the days are numbered for their two existing games, it also means whatever the team was kicking around in conceptual form will likely never see the light of day. Studio head Cliff Bleszinski has even shared a few of those concepts through social media.

What's really interesting about the concepts Bleszinski has been revealing over the past 24 hours is just how different they are from one another. The studio was young, obviously, so it's kind of cool (and also very sad) to see what directions they might have headed while feeling out a place for themselves in the crowded games market.

The above image, for instance, is a piece of conceptual work for one of the games Boss Key had been considering, Dragonflies. Apparently, all of the conceptual stuff was turned down before the team finally procured funding for LawBreakers, the doomed arena shooter. That makes sense, since I still say LawBreakers sounds like a winner on paper for a genre that isn't all that crowded. Unfortunately, Overwatch has proven that a single title can be "crowd" enough if it has captured a lot of attention.

Dragonflies hits me especially hard, because Bleszinski describes it as a kitchen-sink of fantasy and fun. You play as pirate samurai and ninja who just so happen to ride armored dragons and explore the world in aerial ships. Whether playing solo or co-op, your goal was to take out the undead hordes that have overtaken the world below.

The next game, DogWalkers, was apparently inspired by the film Fury. We figure it could have easily been converted to a standard format, but the original concept was for virtual reality. The game was intended to be a 5v5 war game that kind of sounds like a multiplayer version of Star Trek: Bridge Crew. You and your team would stalk the battlefield fighting other walkers, with one player steering the machine, another taking care of repairs, another firing the weapons, etc. Much like Dragonflies, this seems pretty ambitious, especially since, while successful, VR gaming hasn't exactly taken the world by storm. A team-based multiplayer game that relies on loads of cooperation would be a difficult sell.

Finally, there's Donuts, easily the best-named game on the lot. What's interesting is that this was intended as yet another VR game, showing how interested in the technology Bleszinski and his crew were. This particular game's scope was more zoomed in than the previous two and, after reading about it, I'm a bit surprised it got a pass.

This was a racing game where players take on the role of cartoony animals riding tubes down a river course. That could make for some great VR visuals, plus the player's hand movements were used to paddle the boat and change direction.

It's a bummer that LawBreakers and Radical Heights didn't work out for Boss Key. Looking at these concepts, we can't help but wonder where they would have been in another five or so years.

Following the premature death of his studio's first major game and a follow-up that was failing to make a big splash, Cliff Bleszinski has announced the closure of Boss Key Productions and his decision to step away from the industry, at least for the time being.

Many would argue the writing was on the wall for Boss Key Productions while others held out hope that the studio's most recent efforts would somehow save the day. As of this week, though, Bleszinski has confirmed the former, announcing the closure of his studio.

In the above tweet, Bleszinski explains that the men and women of Boss Key put in four years' worth of solid work to create two games. The former studio head argued that their first game, LawBreakers, simply failed to find an audience while their follow-up, Radical Heights, was simply "too little, too late."

Last year, LawBreakers hit the scene with a resounding thud. An arena shooter, it was battling for attention alongside games like Overwatch, and it also happened to arrive just as PUBG was becoming a mega-hit. LawBreakers was well received, noted for being highly polished and, despite some uninspired world and character design, it provided a fast and frantic take on the genre with some very clever manipulation of gravity. I actually had a lot of fun during my time with the game, but it simply never managed to find an audience.

Just as Boss Key was announcing that it would cease development on LawBreakers, the team followed up with an announcement that a new game was already on the way. This new game sported a very fast turnaround, which is why it was being introduced to the world as a free-to-play, very early beta. That game was Radical Heights, yet another entry in the battle royale arena. As Bleszinski points out in his message, Radical Heights was pretty well received but, again, it was unpolished and very early on in development, and that's no way to try to grab a piece of the pie currently being gobbled up by games like Fortnite.

Similar to LawBreakers, Radical Heights' player count dropped off quickly, though its all-time peak was several thousand above its predecessor. Still, the 24-hour concurrent player count is no longer breaking 700, which isn't enough to keep a game like this afloat.

Bleszinski took a moment to share some nice comments about his team before explaining his personal plans following the studio's closure. He said he's going to take some time off in order to reflect and focus on both himself and his family. The good news for Bleszinski fans is that he mentions a desire to return to creating someday, though not until he gets a breather.

Cliff Bleszinski took to twitter this week accusing his former employer, Epic Games, of trying to hire away members of his development team. We've got our fingers crossed that a rap battle will soon help squash the beef.

The above tweet from Cliffy B. makes it pretty clear that he suspects Epic Games of poaching members of his team. He notes that Boss Key Productions just launched their latest game, Radical Heights, using Unreal Engine 4 and that the squad is happy with how things are going.

Bleszinski followed that tweet with a statement that there's room in the battle royale genre for "more than a few games," implying that Epic is trying to hamstring the competition by luring away its staff.

In case you missed the chain of events, it all began last summer when Bleszinski's studio launched LawBreakers, an arena shooter that never managed to earn an audience. At the time, PUBG was cited as being a reason for LawBreakers' downfall, though we'd probably blame a more direct competitor, Overwatch.

Anyway, LawBreakers' user numbers continued to shrink while PUBG grew and Fortnite Battle Royale entered the arena to become the new 100-player king. Keep in mind that Fortnite is an Epic game, the studio Bleszinski left several years ago to start his own company, and this is also the company he's accusing of poaching his staff.

Fast-forward to a few weeks ago and Boss Key announced they were shutting down further development on LawBreakers to focus on a new passion project. That was almost immediately followed by the reveal of Boss Key's own battle royale game, Radical Heights, which was then immediately launched into super early access on Steam.

Based on Bleszinski's tweet, it appears his stance is that Epic is trying to lure away his staff because Radical Heights is a new competitor in the genre Fortnite currently rules. For the record, Boss Key's co-founder, Arjan Brussee, left the studio to work on the mobile version of Fortnite while another staffer, Will McCarroll, also left to work at Epic. Since these things always seem to happen on twitter these days, McCarroll tweeted that Bleszinski's assertion was "a bit presumptuous," as staff members left Boss Key to work for Epic for their own reasons. He also notes that Bleszinski's statement pegs employees as "commodities being stolen" rather than actual people, which he said was hurtful.

As for how Radical Heights is doing, it's hard to tell. The Steam charts currently have the game at an all-time peak of 12,214, which is almost double the record for LawBreakers despite the fact that the latter was a fully-fleshed out, complete game. However, the 24-hour peak right now is just shy of 4,000 players only a week after the game first launched in early access. It's still far too early to judge, of course, as future updates and improvements may create enough buzz to draw in more and more players. We'll just have to wait and see.

One of the most influential developers of the seventh generation of gaming, working for Epic Games under the Microsoft brand, was Cliff Bleszinski. The Gears of War franchise really took off and helped cement the Xbox as a legitimate threat to PlayStation. Well, now he's making the PR rounds for his game Lawbreakers and here's what he thinks of Project Scorpio.

In a Reddit Ask Us Anything thread, Bleszinski states...

Bleszinski doesn't get into detail about how much he knows about Scorpio or whether or not he's working with the hardware. The majority of the AMA is about the upcoming game Lawbreakers for PC and PS4. The question Bleszinski is responding to was actually skimming over the topic of the game potentially coming to the Xbox platforms.

Typically, most people were probably a little curious about this due to the fact that Cliffy B., and the rest of Epic, really shot to the moon in terms of prestige and recognition within the gaming industry thanks to the forward thinking design of Gears of War. Both the Unreal Engine and the game itself were consistently improving over the years, along with paving the way for more developers to make use of the tools and bring their own creations to life. It was that tandem creativity of elevating the design tools and the game itself that allowed Epic to eventually excel and reach the current plateau with the Unreal Engine 4, which is one of the most comprehensive design tools on the market for big or small studios alike.

The Coalition managed to pick up where Epic Games left off with the Gears of War series, and Bleszinski obviously had some words of encouragement (and criticism for the team), but now he's focused on projects away from Epic and Microsoft. So, he's not beholden to saying nice or pretty things about the company, but he still managed to roll out some words of praise for Project Scorpio.

He also mentions that it's still possible Lawbreakers could end up on Microsoft's new system at some point in the future. For now, they're focused on the PC and PS4 release, with both versions being playable at the Boss Key Productions booth at E3 this year.

Apparently Nexon struck a deal with Sony to get Lawbreakers on the PS4 for an exclusive amount of time, but if they can later get the game up and running on the Xbox Scorpio with some added bells and whistles, it would likely be a real treat for Xbox fans.

Bleszinski is definitely right about Microsoft getting their house in order, though. From a spec perspective, the Scorpio absolutely trounces the PlayStation 4 Pro. There's a lot of unified and progressive technology being used to push the entire medium forward, and it's left little in the way of complaints from gamers when it comes to power and performance (something the Xbox One has been handily criticized for since 2013).

Now all we have to do is wait for E3 to see what Microsoft unveils on the software front for the Project Scorpio. Meanwhile Bleszinski and Boss Key Productions' Lawbreakers is gearing up for release on PC and PS4 later this year.

Gears of War 4 is generally received well by die-hard fans and critics. Those who only occasionally dip their toe into the series weren't too impressed, but those who also worked on the series weren't entirely won over either... such as the original creator, Cliff Bleszinski.

Cliff Bleszinski, who is now working on Lawbreakers, managed to share some wisdom about Gears of War 4 and how it made him feel. Gamespot picked up the quote from the former front man at Epic Games, who explained....

There's a lot to unpack here, but first up... I never thought I would see Gears of War and Star Wars being compared to one another, but there you have it.

To be completely honest, Bleszinsky hits the nail on the head. Gear of War 4 looks good, and the story wasn't too bad, but the execution was the epitome of safe storytelling.

When you measure up the journey in the original Gears of War (and a bit of Gears of War 2) and compare it with Gears of War 4, you'll find that the hardships the characters go through are vastly different. Marcus starts his journey getting busted out of jail, and battles through an assault on the prison as helicopters crash down around him and the Locusts swarm him and his friend Dominic. The journey in the first game doesn't get any easier for the duo as they join Delta Squad, which grows and shrinks throughout the journey. This was also true for Gears of War 2.

For J.D. Fenix -- the son of Marcus Fenix -- the journey felt more like Ferris Bueller's Day Off with guns.

There were a few harrowing moments, particularly one scene in the village, but, beyond that, the story was relatively tame and the gameplay experience was equally safe. They added some new special weapons, but they didn't drastically add or change the gameplay experience.

Additionally, there weren't any standout moments that really put the characters in danger like Marcus and Dom when they encounter the Kryll, and the duo have to stay quiet and in the light to avoid being eaten alive; or when Delta Squad first met General Raam and were being hunted down in the streets like dogs; or when they were being chased through the abandoned buildings by a Berserker. There was also a lack of desperation in Gears 4, like when the Assault Derricks get overrun by the Locusts, led by Skorge, in Gears of War 2.

Bleszinski is definitely right that the game gets some things right but could have gone a little deeper, a little darker, to make it feel like J.D., and his friends had to really earn that victory. Some gamers in the comment section feel as if Gears of War needs a little bit of reinvention to help kickstart interest in the series again. While it received a lot of middling-to-positive feedback and critical review scores, it wasn't like Gears of War 4 was really setting the gaming world on fire the way the original trilogy did so many years ago.

The Coalition, of course, stepped into some really big shoes and they'll likely need time to get acquainted with the series and the characters before we see them really try something wild and crazy with Gears of War.

When game designer Cliff Bleszinski retired from gaming back in 2012, it turns out he didn't mean “for a couple of years while I recharge my batteries.” In a recent interview, he explained that, for a little while at least, he thought he was walking away for good.

In a recent interview with Destructoid, Bleszinski explained that he had grown weary of the games industry in it entirety.

Cliffy B. made quite the name for himself from a very young age, having a huge hand in both the Unreal series, as well as the Xbox exclusive hit series, Gears of War. Back in 2012, Bleszinski announced that he was stepping away from games entirely, and now we have a reason for why that is. In chatting with Destructoid, he explained that pretty much everyone he interacted with had become jaded.

That's not all that surprising in this current generation of gaming. Making a big AAA game costs a lot of money. For publishers to feel confident in moving forward with such a project, it seems like you've either got to be pitching a sequel or offering up a surefire winner. There is, of course, no such thing as a surefire winner, which is probably why Cliffy had such a hard time convincing folks to try something different. You can't really blame the guy for wanting to step away from a career where he thought he was the only one who was still excited about making and playing games.

After a few years away from the industry, though, Bleszinski appears to be ready to shake up the games industry once again. Heading up his new studio at Boss Key, the team is hard at work getting the recently announced arena shooter LawBreakers ready for prime time.

It's probably appropriate that LawBreakers looks so much like the beloved Unreal Tournament, giving Cliffy B. a chance to return to his roots and inject a fan-favorite genre with some modern muscle and concepts. If this takes hold and shows the director that the industry is still open to new ideas, there's no telling what might be coming from Boss Key next.

The man behind Gears of War, Cliff Bleszinski, has a new project coming down the pipeline he’s currently referring to as “The Shattering.” More details on the free-to-play PC shooter were released today alongside a teaser trailer, with even more announcements scheduled for Tuesday and Wednesday of this week.

Working with his new development team, Boss Key, Bleszinski launched a brand new teaser site for their upcoming game over the weekend. Formerly known as Project Bluestreak, the game is now being referred to as The Shattering. To make matters a little more convoluted, apparently that’s not necessarily the final name of the game, either.

We’ve known about Project Bluestreak/The Shattering/Some Other Name for a while now, including the fact that it is planned to be a free-to-play shooter for PC, set in a destroyed sci-fi world. It also runs on Unreal Engine 4, which should come as no big surprise.

While that’s not a heck of a lot to go on, it looks like we can expect a couple of days’ worth of fresh announcements throughout the rest of the week. While the website for Not The Shattering went up on Sunday, the first teaser trailer went live early this afternoon.

This first clip, called “After the Shattering,” certainly lives up to the word “teaser.” There are several seconds of a blank screen, followed by several seconds giving a glimpse of some destroyed buildings, followed by far more seconds promising further details later this week.

So we assume there are still plenty of additional details to come. Another update is due out on Tuesday at 12 p.m. Eastern, with a third to follow on Wednesday at the same time. There’s even a countdown clock on the site, in case you want to be absolutely certain you’re tuned in the moment the big reveal goes live.

In the meantime, you can read some developer blogs on the site and sign up for an account. There’s also an inactive tab for alpha testing sign-up, which we’re guessing will be live in the not-too-distant future.

So, for the time being, your guess is as good as ours as to what Bleszenski’s new game actually is (or even what it’s called). Will it be more like Gears of War or something akin to, say, Blizzard’s Overwatch? Maybe a mixture of the two, like what Gearbox looks to be doing with its next game, Battleborn?

No clue! But at least it doesn’t look like we have much longer to wait until we finally get some more solid details.

PC gaming will finally take center stage during this year’s Electronic Entertainment Expo (E3), with a special press conference set to take place on June 16 geared toward the latest tech, games and developer news.

In recent years, E3 press conferences have typically been all about home consoles and a handful of publishers with a big enough stable to warrant their own show. Usual suspects include PlayStation and Xbox shows and, until recently, Nintendo. Electronic Arts is also typically good for a big, live press conference, alongside Ubisoft and a couple others.

While PC gaming and technology always has a large presence on the Los Angeles Convention Center floor, it looks like PC Gaming has decided to give its platform developers a moment to shine, putting together yet another live press conference to add to the growing list.

"PC gaming is in a golden age, with more powerful and affordable hardware than ever before, thousands of games available through Steam, Origin and other platforms, and millions of viewers regularly watching eSports online," reads the rundown at the event’s official website. "Now, for the first time, the PC platform will have its own event during E3, where the community will be able to celebrate this era with some of the biggest names in PC gaming and see the innovations that lie ahead."

While the majority of press conferences will take place on June 15, the day before the E3 convention officially kicks off, the PC show will be held during the first regular day of the show. In recent years, this is the same day Nintendo holds its “Direct” virtual conference, too, rather than putting on a big live show.

Hosted out of the Belasco Theater, PC Gaming has partnered with Twitch to make sure everyone can get in on the action live, promising all of the usual press conference trimmings such as game reveals, updates and maybe even a few surprises.

The PC Gaming Show will be hosted by Sean Plott, better known by many as Day[9], who has gained notoriety as an eSports commentator. He’ll be joined on stage by many developers and publishers, including Blizzard Entertainment, Cliff Bleszinski, Devolver, Paradox Interactive, Square Enix and Humble Bundle, just to name a few.

This is one of those things that makes so much sense, you’re not entirely sure why it hasn't happened until now. PC gaming is obviously a huge market but, until now, the platform has never had its own event during one of the biggest games conventions in the world. It'll be nice to see even more developers have an opportunity to speak directly to their fans while also showing off some highly anticipated titles.

Now if only someone would put together a show for mobile gaming, E3 would be complete.

Few names are as well known around the gaming community as Epic’s design director, Cliff Bleszinski. Today, however, it has been announced that Cliffy B’s title will now include the word “former,” as he has officially departed from the company he’s helped run for the past two decades.

The announcement went out through the Epic blog, which states that Bleszinski will be charting “the next stage of his career.”

Several of Epic’s head honchos shared some kind words regarding Bleszinski’s time with the company, including CEO and technical director Tim Sweeney.

“In 20 wonderful years with Epic, Cliff Bleszinski has grown into a true design luminary, and his contributions to the Unreal and Gears series have helped shape the game industry into what it is today,” Sweeney said. “Cliff leaves Epic with our gratitude for his many contributions, and our wishes for continued success in the next chapter of his life.”

I’ll give you a moment to compose yourself, as you are no doubt sobbing like a small child following this surprising news and those moving words.

The post goes on to include a couple of paragraphs from a letter Bleszinski wrote for his Epic colleagues, saying that it’s time for a “much needed break” after going non-stop in the gaming business since he was in his teens.

“I will miss the projects, the playtests, the debates and, most importantly, the people,” C.B. said. “Epic only hires the best of the best, and it has been a joy working with each and every one of you on a daily basis, whether you were hired weeks ago or decades ago.”

Do you need another moment or is that just some dust particles irritating your contacts?

No word yet on what comes next for Bleszinski but, at this point, the dude has certainly earned that break he was talking about.

Cliff Bleszinski, lead designer of games like Gears of War at renown studio Epic Games, has spoken out about disc-based console systems. In fact, he's spoken out about disc-based gaming in general especially for next-gen consoles, saying “no disc-based games.” That was pretty clear.

The Videogamer picked up the quote from a Reddit AMA, where the popular designer made his intentions clear to focus on digital only outings. This is nothing new given that Cliffy B., was pretty adamant about the future of digital distribution for gaming on the bonus round at Gametrailers.

Cliffy B's comments are equivalent to a lot of what companies like Ubisoft, Funcom and Electronic Arts have been saying throughout the year after retail took a major hit on the monthly numbers. The obvious result is that gamers have probably grown bored with this generation's elongated cycle, but leave it to the “industry experts” to assume that people have given up on hard copies and simply want to download everything.

For sure, it's become quite clear that Microsoft and Sony's newest consoles will launch in a very interesting and different kind of gaming landscape, a lot of it is due to their own doing with the way some hardware choices were handled (i.e., Microsoft sticking with DVD) and with some of the design choices (i.e,. Sony's unnecessarily complex structuring of the Cell and its SPUs).

This also brings up a rather interesting question. What happens to Epic's biggest brand yet, Gears of War if it's not going to be disc-based?

Geoff Keighley of Gametrailers TV has confirmed that Epic Games' latest high-end software will be on showcase for the general public both at E3 and in a special presentation recorded from the offices of Epic Games, along with Cliff Bleszinksi and Tim Sweeny.

According to Game Static, Keighley openly answered questions in a popular thing on reddit called AMA (Ask Me Anything About), and it was inevitable that a few upstanding members of the gaming community would bug the gaming journalist about Epic's tightly kept next-gen engine.

The original question was..."Are we going to see a full reveal of Unreal Engine 4?", to which Keighley replied....

That's actually pretty exciting news because as we know, the Unreal Engine is just as known for its high-end graphical and performance capabilities as it is the ability to accommodate ease-of-use with the Unreal Editor.

Speaking of which, the Unreal Engine 4, according to Epic's Mike Capps, is supposed to be even more indie-friendly than the already very indie-friendly Unreal Engine 3 (which is the current version supported by the Unreal Development Kit). So it'll be neat to see what sort of changes the editor has undergone to better suit the indies and the AAA studios.

We'll keep you posted on additional news regarding the UE4 once E3 rolls around. For more info on Epic and the Unreal Engine feel free to visit the Official Website.

Cliffy B, best known as the lead designer for Gears of War, is no stranger to controversy and his latest comments will probably incite a wrath of fury from the fat-cat suits who run most of their businesses around the idea of focusing on focus groups. Well, Cliff Bleszinski bluntly said at a quick GDC speech that focus groups suck. The statement arrived after he poured out a wealth of information for up-and-coming developers, and basically warned them to stay away from the dreaded focus groups.

The news comes courtesy of Develop who managed to capture the quote in all its glory. Cliffy B., was one of the many developers allotted a small amount of time to talk about the gaming industry and most of his time was spent giving advice to indie devs and some "dos" and "don'ts" to consider when trying to break into the industry. Before ending The Cliffster said the following..."screw focus groups, they suck and need to go away."

It could be that focus groups help steer the general direction of a game's design for many big budget projects as opposed to the designers just doing what they do best. Oftentimes focus groups will chime in with important game changing suggestions or questions, like: should it have multiplayer? Should the multiplayer be cooperative or competitive or both? Should there be some feigned sense of romance tossed in for a feigned sense of emotional connection? Should there be more blood when kicking someone in the face? Should a third of the game's content be locked away as on-disc DLC?

Anyways, don't get hung up on avoiding focus groups. Cliffzinski also mentioned that you need to keep cracking that whip on your design concepts and gameplay implementations. In other words, keep what works and scrap the rest. Don't hesitate to axe content that you spent months working on that doesn't actually work. Makes sense, right?

You can check out a few more of the keynotes from his GDC speech over at Develop...and remember, focus groups suck because the Cliffmeister said so.

The Spike TV Video Game Awards will provide several companies with an opportunity to announce their next games. One of these companies is Epic Games, the folks behind Gears of War and Unreal.

In a teaser video, design director Cliff Bleszinski describes the upcoming game as "entirely new and fresh." They probably won't be announcing a sequel, then. It's a shame, because I would've welcomed another Shadow Complex or Unreal Tournament.

It's possible they'll announce their next mobile game. Infinity Blade II was released through the App Store on December 1st. Considering the success they've had on that platform, it seems possible they'd pursue another IP.

The 2011 Spike Video Game Awards will air on December 10th at 8pm EST. If you don't feel like sitting through the show, just check the internet after its over. Most of the trailers are released immediately after they're aired on the show.

SPIKEEpic Games Teasewww.spike.com

Epic Games' Cliff Bleszinski isn't a fan of the constant gossip about Gears of War coming to the PS3. In a new interview, he was determined to kill the rumors with fire.

"I would say in the foreseeable future there’s zero chances of Gears of War being on the PlayStation 3," Bleszinski told IndustryGamers. "Can we bury that now? Seriously. It’s like, we have a great deal with Microsoft, they’re a great partner..."

Will this kill the rumors? Probably not. The Gears intellectual property is owned by Epic Games rather than Microsoft so they'll always at least have the ability to release the games on a different console, even if they don't have the desire to do so.

Gears of War 3 will arrive on the Xbox 360 on September 20th.

Epic Games, the developer of the Gears of War and Unreal series, is working on a new intellectual property. They're set to unveil it early next year.

Epic's Cliff Bleszinksi revealed the project's existence in the latest issue of EGM. He also said we should keep our "eyes peeled at GDC." The flagship Game Developers Conference in San Francisco will run from February 28th to March 4th.

The only detail Bleszinski spilled about the game is that Prototype lead designer Eric Holmes is working on it. Given Holmes' work on Prototype and another open-world game The Incredible Hulk: Ultimate Destruction, the easy guess would be that his Epic game is a sandbox title. We'll see in a couple months.

Gears of War 3 was just announced today so little gameplay information has been revealed. However, designer Cliff Bleszinski has announced that the game's co-op is getting a boost.

"Also, Rod confirmed and I'm posting it here: 4 player integrated story co op in the campaign!" tweeted Bleszinski.

Four player co-op struck me as something they've wanted to do since the beginning. In the first two games, the story centered around a squad of four soldiers with only two of them playable. Presumably the third and fourth players will control Baird and Cole Train.

GoW3 is set to arrive in April 2011 worldwide on the Xbox 360. The first trailer and release dates can be found here.

Gears of War studio Epic Games will open its new office in Tokyo this week. Epic Games Japan will provide Unreal Engine 3 licensing and technical support for the Japanese market.

The launch event will take place on April 15th at Akiba Hall. Epic Games Japan's territory manager Taka Kawasaki will explain the goals of the studio in detail. Epic CEO Tim Sweeney and VP Jay Wilbur will be in attendance as well, while design director Cliff Bleszinski and president Mike Capps will deliver video messages. No More Heroes designer Goichi Suda and Halo Legends producer Joseph Chou are set to give "congratulatory addresses."

It looks to be a very busy week for Epic. They announced Bulletstorm today and are about to unveil Gears of War 3 as well.

Lately Sony's been the one that botches its surprise announcements but Microsoft reclaimed the throne today. An Xbox Live advertisement has outed Gears of War 3 and its release window.

The ad, spotted by a Joystiq reader, is entitled "Gears of War 3 Announced." A subtitle states that "The epic story concludes on April 2011." That probably caused many a gamer to spit out their Mountain Dew because, well, GoW3 hadn't been announced.

What happened? Well, Gears designer Cliff Bleszinski was supposed to reveal his next game on Late Night with Jimmy Fallon last night. However, he got bumped to Monday so they'd have a couple more days to "polish" the presentation a bit more. Apparently the folks who operate the ad rotation on Xbox Live weren't aware of the change so boom, accidental announcement.

It looks like Epic Games' next title won't be revealed tomorrow night after all. Gears of War designer Cliff Bleszinski's no longer slated to appear on Late Night With Jimmy Fallon.

Tina Fey, Justin Bieber, and chef Mario Batali are now listed as the guests for Thursday's Late Night episode. Bieber is listed as second guest, which is probably the slot they'd give to a humble video game designer. I'm gonna say Bieber once more in this paragraph for Google purposes.

"As much as I'd like to start a fight with @justinbieber the truth of the matter is that we wanted to take a couple more days to polish what we're showing. Sorry all, appreciate your patience!" tweeted Bleszinski earlier tonight.

There's currently no second guest booked for the show on Monday, April 12th Presumably that's when the Bleszinski's appearance has been moved to.

Gears of War 2 has been on a rampage campaign as of late. It’s advertised everywhere, with press releases flying out the door to just about every gaming site there is. If this isn’t enough, Gears 2 also has a lot of vocal promotion from its designer, Cliff Bleszinski. However, Cliff’s continuous public commentaries aren’t serving Gears 2 with a great deal of justice.

If the headline didn’t give anything away, I’m just going to go ahead and point out what everyone else has been thinking: Cliffy B needs to sit down, pick up a controller, play Gears of War 2, and shut the heck up.

Lately it seems like everywhere you look for gaming news, there’s a side bar with at least one article about Clifford: being a dung-pie regarding Mirror’s Edge, complaining about comparisons, dissing demos, or just showing what a jerk-off he really is. I never knew someone could go to such lengths to ruin the hype for their own game by acting like the gaming industry’s version of Paris Hilton, minus the sex tapes.

Apparently the over-exposure of Gears of War 2 just wasn’t enough for Epic’s lead game director. Apparently the advertisements weren’t enticing enough for Mr. Bleszinski. And apparently, all the back-to-back news coverage that every gaming website on the net is giving Gears 2 (not including the very respectable review scores) just isn’t enough to keep Cliff’s mouth shut.

The main problem with this scenario is that there’s no reason for this well-respected designer to act the way he’s acting. It’s reminiscent to the way Tom Cruise burned all the buzz for Mission Impossible: III with his whole “I love Katie Holmes so much I’m gonna kill her” crusade. Just as Tom Cruise became weird and embarrassing, Cliffy B. has managed to emulate Tom’s annoying and obtuse approach to product promotion. Plain and simple, these antics aren’t going to help sell Gears of War 2. The game was already poised to break records, and it’s already been promoted enough. What Cliff is doing will only prove to be overkill for an already over-hyped game.

When it comes time to promote Gears of War 3, maybe Epic will keep a leash on Cliff Bleszinski’s mouth, or at least keep his rancid opinions embargoed until after the NPD results flood in, following the game's release. Otherwise, he could potentially hurt his own game more than the competition will.

Gears of War 2 is currently on store shelves, exclusively for the Xbox 360. Be sure to stay tuned in with Blend Games for more news and info on the latest titles, or drop by the Blend Games Forum to further discuss this topic.

First-person shooter developers typically hold open multiplayer betas so players can test the games out before their release, but don't expect that luxury with any Gears of War game. As GoW designer Cliff Bleszinski explains, it's because Epic Games doesn't want you blowing your load.

In an interview with GamePro, Bleszinski explained his attitude toward betas thusly: "A beta is like hooking up with a girl just to say, 'yeah, I f*cked her.' I know that sounds crude, but it's the honest-to-God truth. Once you play a beta, you can check it off your list -- you can say, "yeah, I played it." Then you might not feel motivated to get that initial cherry popping from the proper, final game."

A beta does kill the initial thrill of release day, sure. If you've already played the game in a beta - for free, no less - you might not have the same enthusiasm for the final retail product as someone who hasn't played it at all. Well, you might. Depends on how good the actual game is and how much content there is in addition to the beta material.

Still, a beta was originally intended for the developer's benefit, not the player. Specifically, it allows them to identify bugs and balance issues before the release so the final product is as polished as possible. "Granted, we may need to tweak a few things in multiplayer after release through an update," Bleszinski admitted. "People are going to find exploits we didn't anticipate. That's the reality of making a game -- look at MMOs. We're prepared for that, but we think we're shipping a pretty great game out of the box here."

Gears of War 2 will be released on November 7th for Xbox 360.

The PS3 has an exclusive sci-fi shooter called Resistance 2 due on November 4th. The Xbox 360 has an exclusive sci-fi shooter called Gears of War 2 due on November 7th. Should you view the two as competitors? Gears of War 2 designer Cliff Bleszinski doesn't.

Speaking to Das Gamer, Bleszinski made it clear that there's no Jets vs. Sharks, Socs vs. Greasers thing between GoW developer Epic Games and Resistance dev Insomniac Games. No rumbles outside of the soda shop for these guys.

"I have a lot of respect for Insomniac. Ted (Price) is a wonderful guy and I think they do great work," Bleszinski said. "Everybody loves this dynasty shit where they want to see Ted and I fighting in a fountain pulling each other’s hair or something like that. Sorry, but it’s not going to happen. They’re making their own sci-fi extravaganza, as are we. When you break it down and look at each game, it’s largely apples to oranges. "

Apples to oranges might not be the best metaphor for it. Comparing Resistance 2 and Gears of War 2 is more like comparing two different kinds of apples that are going to make ass-tons of money on different consoles. Point made, though, Cliff.

Both Gears of War games have been developed by Epic Games. If it's up to GoW designer Cliff Bleszinski, the series will stay with Epic for good. He's not fond of all the developer swinger parties going on.

"We've got a lot of ideas about where the franchise will go," Bleszinski told Develop. "But sometimes I feel a franchise loses something when it's shifted off to another shop. You get the primary studio that really understands about the franchise, and sometimes the other studio that takes it over can do well, but there's something lost in translation, like the game's soul has gone."

The takeaway most fanboys will have is that he's slamming Call of Duty (Treyarch and Infinity Ward tag-team on the series) or Halo (the RTS Halo Wars was shipped out to Ensemble Studios). World At War and Halo Wars don't really look all that bad, though and it's doubtful he was specifically slamming these high-profile games. There's much worse examples out there of mishandled franchises - Soldier of Fortune: Payback, anyone?

Furthermore, what do you expect him to say? A developer wants to keep control over its creative work even if the other developer is skilled. Though Fallout 3 looks like it'll be solid, I imagine the former Interplay designers wish they had made it themselves.

When Gears of War 2 hits stores in November, it'll come with a piece of the original game. Five of the multiplayer maps from the original Gears of War will also appear as release date DLC. There's one catch, though.

GoW 2 designer Cliff Bleszinski told GamePro that GoW maps Gridlock, Subway, Canals, Mansion, and Tyro Station will be included in the DLC. You'll be able to download the maps by using a voucher included in new copies of GoW2.

In other words, if you wait to buy a used copy from Gamestop, you'll be S.O.L. on the free map pack. Presumably you'll be able to buy it off Xbox Live, too. Clever way for Epic Games to fight the used games market (publishers/developers don't make a dime off a game being resold). Gears of War 2 will hit stores on November 7th exclusively on Xbox 360.

Xbox fanboys, the crisis has been averted. No other platform is going to get their grubby hands on your precious exclusive. Gears of War 2, unlike its predecessor, will not be released on the PC.

Head designer Cliff Bleszinski told IGN on Friday that "Gears of War is a great franchise first and foremost for Xbox 360, and therefore we're focusing on that platform for Gears of War 2. We've decided we're not going to do a PC version this time around. "

Of course, many of you are probably skeptical - after all, the first GoW started out as an exclusive and ended up on the PC in a year. It doesn't look like Epic was pleased with the sales on PC, though. Cliffy B told MTV Multiplayer back in February, "I think people would rather make a game that sells 4.5 million copies than a million and "Gears" is at 4.5 million right now on the 360. I think the PC is just in disarray." Weren't too pleased with the critical reception, either; in an interview with MundoRare in July, Epic Games honcho Mike Capps had this to say about reviews for the PC version (which were slightly less favorable than 360 version reviews): "What we did was take a great game, Gears of War 1 for Xbox 360, made it run at higher resolutions and added three new hours of really good gameplay and it got lower reviews. I think that's bullshit, and I don't understand it. I can't figure out what it is."

If you still insist on holding out hope for a PC port, though, go ahead. If GoW2 makes an ass-ton of money - which it will - there's always going to be the temptation for Epic to hire out some other studio to make a PC iteration. However, right now, the answer is "No."

Epic Games re-released the original Gears of War earlier this summer to give new Xbox 360 owners a chance to check it out. It might be a good idea if you're planning on buying the sequel this November, because some of your accomplishments from the first game will unlock features in the second.

GoW designer Cliff Bleszinski gave a presentation on the sequel at Comic-Con on Saturday and mentioned the game would include "linked Achievements." He gave three examples of how they would work. If you completed the first act of Gears of War, you would unlock a playable Anthony Carmine in Gears of War 2. If you found 10 COG tags, you would unlock a playable Lieutenant Kim. Killing the last boss, General RAAM, would likewise unlock him as a playable character.

I assume these are all multiplayer-only skins because all three of these characters die in the first Gears of War game. I guess that's a spoiler but is it really that surprising that Random Space Marines #4 and #5 and the final boss get killed? Given how similar all three examples of linked Achievements were, it's possible that all of the unlockables will be limited to multiplayer vanity content. You'll be able to demonstrate your 1337-ness but it won't change gameplay in any concrete fashion. The Limited Edition for GoW2 will ship with a code for a gold-plated Lancer Assault Rifle for online matches so maybe the game will have linked Achievements to unlock new weapon skins, too. I want my Lancer covered in platinum, Bleszinski.