Rogue Warrior development studio Rebellion Derby is to be shut down. UK developer Rebellion, currently working on Aliens vs. Predator for SEGA, also has studios in Oxford and Runcorn.

In a statement, CEO Jason Kingsley said, “Growth is sometimes painful, never more so than in the current climate and we have had to take a long hard look at how we operate our studio network. Strategically we have decided to review the need for the Derby facilities, and consultation with staff at Derby is ongoing.”

The Derby studio is the same responsible for Eidos’ Tomb Raider series. Aliens vs. Predator, under development at the Oxford studio, is unaffected. Yesterday, Rebellion’s Alex Moore announced that the game would receive a playable demo, but no date was fixed.

 

SEGA has won its appeal to have Aliens vs. Predator released in Australia, meaning the uncut version of the game will be released under the MA15+ rating. The title had previously been banned in Australia following the Classification Board’s declaration that the game was too violent for Australia’s maximum MA15+ rating and SEGA’s refusal to “sanitise”.

Developer Rebellion then wrote, “The content of AVP is based on some of the most innovative and iconic horror movies, and as such we wanted to create a title that was true to the source material. It is for adults, and it is bloody and frightening, that was our intent. We will not be releasing a sanitised or cut down version for territories where adults are not considered by their governments to be able to make their own entertainment choices.”

 

Developer Rebellion has refused to make a youth-friendly version of Aliens vs. Predator for the Australian market after the game was deemed too explicit for the country’s MA15+ rating.

In a statement, the developer called out the Australian government, claiming that it does not consider its adult constituents “able to make their own entertainment choices.”

 

Developers Rebellion have today revealed that the PC release of Aliens vs. Predator will include support for Microsoft's DirectX 11.

The addition of DirectX 11 hardware tessellation enables Rebellion to capture the detail, essence and tone of the Aliens and Predator movies, providing players with what they've described as "the most unique gaming experience in franchise history."

Chris Kingsley, CTO of Rebellion said, “DirectX 11 provides opportunities never exploited before in 3D graphical terms, with features such as the Shader Model 5.0 providing better shadow and depth of field aspects to the game, and also multi-threaded rendering enabling the Aliens Vs. Predator futuristic characters and environments to be realised in exacting detail but with absolutely no frame rate issues. We are confident we will deliver a game the fans have been waiting for and one of which we will be very proud.”

SEGA today revealed details of their FPS action horror game, Aliens vs. Predator (working title). It will be the first title to be launched in SEGA’s forthcoming series of Aliens games licensed by Twentieth Century Fox.

Developed at Rebellion by the team responsible for the original 1999 classic, in the all-new Aliens vs. Predator players will have the chance to take the role of the three species; the Colonial Marine, the Predator and the Alien. Each of the three species has its very own distinct story-driven single-player campaign mode that interweaves with the campaigns of the other two species.

Aliens vs. Predator will also feature 3-way online multiplayer, allowing gamers to pit the three species against each other.