Housemarque has teased an announcement tomorrow, and there’s a special reason for that date.
On Twitter, they shared some artwork with the words “Tomorrow” prominent near the center right.
The artwork is easily identified to be of Selene Vassos, the protagonist of Housemarque’s latest game, Returnal. Selene has heterochromia, which manifests in how different her eyes are. Although the illustration is in black and white, we can see that the shapes inside the iris and around it are different. The reason these shapes are different, and they are visibly different eyes, is because they have different colors.
But of course, you can also see that we don’t actually look at the eyes directly. If you take a few minutes to process the image, you will realize that the eyes are actually reflected on broken glass. We are looking at broken glass, and not Selene directly. But most interestingly, if the glass is reflecting this image at us, it suggests that we are looking at the image from Selene’s eyes, or at least her viewpoint.
But really, the main thing about this tease is the fact that their last game, Returnal, released on April 30, 2021. That makes tomorrow the game’s 3 year anniversary. And it implies that this coming announcement is related to the title.
Housemarque’s modest origins made it one of the most important video game studios in Finland. The truth is, they formed in 1994 as a merger of two smaller Finnish PC game studios, Bloodhouse and Terramarque. They continued to make smaller scale games as Housemarque for years.
After two decades in that space, they were acquired by Sony in 2014, where they were put in the position of making small games for PlayStation for nearly a decade. This time, however, those smaller games were also deliberately designed as showpieces for PlayStation’s consoles and technology.
Resogun, Super Stardust Ultra, Alienation, Nex Machina, and Matterfall, are reminiscent of 1980s Atari and Midway arcade games, with a neon voxel aesthetic. Housemarque learned to make this particular kind of game, that had a limited appeal even among PlayStation owners, but proved popular enough to keep going.
But then came Returnal, the first true AAA title from the studio in its entire history. Sony deliberately chose to make Housemarque a AAA studio themselves. The studio announced they were moving away from that niche they occupied, as they weren’t making the money that it needed. Sony helped them find that niche, and they also supported their transition to a AAA, or some would argue a AA, company.
Returnal is on PlayStation 5 and Windows, so this announcement could go in many different directions. They could be working on a Returnal 2. But they could also be bringing that original Returnal to other platforms. That could include Xbox, Nintendo, game streaming platforms, etc.
Returnal and Housemarque fans definitely cannot miss whatever they will be announcing tomorrow.
