Activision unveil new studio working on 'narrative AAA franchise', days after Microsoft shut Prey and Evil Within devs

Around a week after Microsoft shuttered a number of beloved studios with a track record of making excellent single-player, story-driven games, their newly-owned arm of Activision has revealed a brand new studio. Working on a new series of story-driven, triple-A games.

The unveiling of Elsewhere Entertainment comes days after the sudden and shocking closure of Arkane Austin, Tango Gameworks and Alpha Dog Games, who between them have been responsible for games including Prey, The Evil Within, Tokyo: Ghostwire, Hi-Fi Rush and more.

With the exception of multiplayer misfire Redfall, the likes of Arkane and Tango were arguably known for specialising in inventive and well-liked-to-loved single-player titles built around their narratives, making the emergence of a new studio doing exactly that somewhat frustrating timing.

It's worth noting, of course, that Activision and Microsoft operate separately in many respects - including budgets - despite now being merged into one multi-billion-dollar megacorp, so the new Activision studio's launch isn't directly tied to Microsoft's decision to close several other developers. (Elsewhere will apparently draw from Activision's resources and use their tools for their projects.)

On top of that, the Polish team made up of devs with experience on Naughty Dog's The Last of Us and Uncharted, CD Projekt Red's The Witcher and Cyberpunk 2077, and Ubisoft's The Division and Far Cry was apparently put together a little while back, rather than being freshly formed now.

Given those particular credits, it might not come as a surprise to learn that Elsewhere will be working on an original "narrative-based and genre-defining AAA franchise", which lines up with those blockbuster single-player titles.

"The team's underlying mission encourages everyone to explore and collaborate creatively to craft a franchise with an enduring legacy that resonates far beyond games," Activision added in their announcement.

By "enduring legacy" and "resonates beyond games", I can only assume they mean "makes a whole boatload of money and gets turned into a prestige TV show like The Last of Us and The Witcher". Whatever it ends up being, expect it to be at least a while off while Elsewhere continues to staff up on their debut project.