It looks like gamers might not see a new Ken Levine game for at least a few years.
According to a recent report from Bloomberg, Ken Levine, creator of the 2022 game BioShock, the next game has been in development hell. 15 current and former employees of Ghost Story Games, Levine's game studio, leaked the information. The project entered production in 2022 and has reportedly gone through a number of reboots and changes along the way. The game is being developed for game publisher Take-Two and eight years later still doesn't have a name or release date.
Many of the developers involved, unfortunately, name Levine as the reason for the game's development issues. They said, "Levine is a flawed manager who often struggles to communicate his vision and alienates or bullies subordinates who challenge him or do not meet their expectations. Most of the current and former employees who spoke out "required anonymity because they feared repercussions."
Several employees involved in Levine's upcoming game started running around the office referencing the movie Creation. The developers described participating in something they call "Kenception" in order to deal with Levine's difficult work style. They say persuading Levine on an idea can be so arduous, the process is almost like needing to infiltrate a person's dream to plant the idea so they believe they've invented it themselves.
Half of Ghost Story Games' original team has now left the company according to Bloomberg. Game developer Mike Snight is one such person who now works elsewhere and said, “Ken is a very difficult person to work for. I think he tried a lot to change, and he really excels at that business than Irrational, because it's a smaller group of people. Ghost Story employees said Levine was given a lot of autonomy on this new game, which wasn't necessarily a good thing. A developer has said that although the progress of the new game has improved recently, its release date may not be before 2024, when it was originally planned to be released in the fall of 2022.
It looks like BioShock fans still have some time to wait for Ken Levine's next game.
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