“Through the looking glass”: as Arkane fight for their future, Dishonored veteran Harvey Smith reveals new studio dedicated to immersive sims

Days after Deus Ex director Warren Spector announced that he was quitting the business, another former Ion Storm developer, Harvey Smith, has revealed Black Pony Immersive – a new studio dedicated to the creation of “imaginative first-person action RPGs set within well-realized worlds, where players create their own memorable experiences with expressive, emergent game systems.” The announcement features the maxim: “through the looking glass, we’re chasing a dream of mystery, meaning, and creative play.” Hey, I understood that reference! Sure sounds like an imsim shop to me.

Black Pony are based, or at least, “centralised” out in Austin, Texas. Smith – former creative director for Dishonored 2 – is joined in the cockpit by a couple of other former Arkane developers, Ben Horne and Ricardo Bare. The studio’s wider workforce are located around the United States, and include people who’ve spent time at Spider-Man makers Insomniac, Fortnite wranglers Epic, Just Cause inventors Avalanche, and Saints Row… bejanglers Volition.

It’s a hopeful turn of events because it wasn’t long ago that Microsoft closed Arkane Austin, creators of the very good Prey 2017 and the sadly not very good Redfall. Nic (RPS in peace) had thoughts. Microsoft are currently taking the axe to what’s left of Arkane in Lyon – as of writing, the developers are haggling out the terms of their sale, closure or buyout with the Xbox team. Smith alludes to this in a forgiveably buzzwordy press release.

“During a time of industry volatility, I’m proud to announce the next step in my video game journey with the reveal of our new studio,” he writes. “This effort reflects everything we’ve learned, and all we hold dear. My favorite gaming memories come from seeing players approach challenges with creativity, deep-diving into our world building. We try to reward players for their curiosity and exploration. At our new studio, we’re building exactly the kind of single-player games we’re most passionate about.”

The developers don’t have a game to reveal as yet, but Horne notes that “this group has worked together for years, decades in some cases, and is purpose-built to make the ambitious games we love – immersive sims”. We can expect more details “soon”. Dear Mr Horne: please can I have an immersive sim that takes place entirely inside the squirming, reactive innards of a very large whale, like the horrible leviathans from Dishonored. We could call it “Jonah’s Ex” or “The Xbox Acquisition Experience”.