Bethesda may have just leaked the title of MachineGames’ Indiana Jones game, and there might not have been much they can do about it.
As reported by Video Games Chronicle, Twitter user Kurakasis found LucasFilm registered several website domains for a new Indiana Jones title: Indiana Jones and The Great Circle. One of the domains is literally http://indianajonesandthegreatcirclegame.com.
Kurakasis also found that LucasFilm filed trademarks for the title The Great Circle, two years ago, in Europe, for goods and services, specifically for video games. It also includes registrations for mobile games. Kurakasis speculates that this is because this game could be streamed by Game Pass users via Xcloud. Or, they just want to secure the trademark even if they don’t plan to use it, just to make sure nobody else tries to use it.
I will point out that it’s also possible LucasFilm has commissioned a separate mobile game with the same title. That mobile version of Indiana Jones and The Great Circle would likely to be made by another studio. That could maybe even a studio outside of Microsoft Gaming.
We know that MachineGames’ upcoming Indiana Jones title will be part of the second Xbox Developer Direct, that will go live next week. Some fans may think that LucasFilm made some kind of mistake by letting this go public, but it’s more likely that they already expected this to get out.
Of course, when companies file these trademarks, the countries where they file those trademarks set a date when those trademarks will go public. So LucasFilm knew when this title would go public, and Microsoft, Bethesda, and MachineGames probably also knew well in advance.
If anything, Microsoft likely scheduled the Xbox Developer Direct with this title disclosure in mind. They may have even already decided this last year, after seeing how successful the first Developer Direct turned out. This title reveal would start buzz about the Indiana Jones game. They could then take advantage of that buzz to increase interest for their Developer Direct, and get more eyes to see the event itself, or at least follow the news.
As some have already pointed out, this is the start of a very big year for Microsoft. Even without taking the Activision deal into account, Microsoft revealed that they have had so many games in the works for the past few years, and they will finally be publishing those games.
They have enough in the bank to release a game every quarter for the next few years, presumably until the end of the Xbox Series X|S. Xbox owners will definitely have a lot to celebrate this year.
