Eric Nofsinger, chief creative officer of High Voltage Studios, revealed while talking to Eurogamer that a 3DS version of The Conduit is in development. He said the development is still in its early stages, as the team is currently busy with Conduit 2.

“Now that we’re winding things down a lot of our resources are on pulling this technology over to 3DS,” he said. “We are very much pulling over this engine and this technology on this new hardware.

“We’re still early. The resolution is definitely lower, but the screen real estate is smaller so it balances out. We’ve not had a lot of severe optimization yet, but we’re going to be able to have something very close to this Conduit on the 3DS probably by GDC.

“We’ve got environments from this already up and running around. You can shoot, you can select different weapons and you can see enemies. It runs pretty darn well with full 3D and everything.”

While talking about the multiplayer component, he said the team was very excited about the new, improved Friend Codes. “We’re very excited about that system and what we’re going to be be able to do on it,” he added later.

He said it was different to develop games for the 3DS than to develop them for the DS or DSi. He said developers who wanted a game to have a console experience would prefer the 3DS. “It’s quite different than developing for the DS and the DSi,” he said. “Developers like us that have more of a console experience on GameCube and on Wii are going to be able to take advantage of the 3D better and they’re going to be able to do a little bit more with the hardware than people who are coming at it from the straight DS angle and used to doing more 2D, or very limited 3D, kinds of things… We can be a shining star on this.”

When asked who would be publishing the game, he said the studio was in talks with SEGA. “I would guess that SEGA will be interested. I had a nice conversation just yesterday with their head of artist and repertoire. At DICE, the conference in Vegas that’s coming up, we’ll probably have some more chats.”

The 3DS will be out later next month. Will you people buy it on launch?

The newly released trailer for SEGA’s upcoming sci-fi First Person Shooter, developed by High Voltage Studios, The Conduit 2, is that kind of trailer that can get anybody super-psyched for that specific game. Have a look at it, the second installment looks much more promising than the first.

The Conduit 2 will be released for the Wii in February 2011.

Speaking to IGN, the developer confirmed that a total of twenty five people had been affected.

“I can confirm that High Voltage Software has reduced some of our staffing based on our current production requirements and predictions of what is needed for the remainder of 2010,” a studio representative confirmed.

“We are sad to have to say goodbye to these employees and friends, but these changes are necessary to bring our organization to a healthy operational size.”

Well, they better at least have a good game released after this. Both, The Conduit and Tournament of Legends, have been extreme disappointments, and Conduit 2 better be good. If only so that you can justify firing twenty five people out of the blue.

The shooter, which will be releasing on Wii this autumn, has low expectations from many fans after Conduit 1 failed at retail.

“It really was a lot for the team to handle at one time,” Nofsinger said of establishing a new IP and creating an engine from scratch. The result was a game that is fun to play and is solid overall, but never quite manages to excite its audience with inspired visions of a darkly futuristic world that’s being torn apart by aliens.”

“We’re doing whatever it takes to make Conduit 2 the very best that it can,” promised Nofsinger, “because we love the game and our audience.”

High Voltage promises a much more solid game this time, “We’re designing spaces that players will want to fight in.” They aren’t doing anything they aren’t “completely excited about making”.

“There’s a lot more that we still want to accomplish with this game before it ships, and fortunately we still have time to execute on our initial goal to build a game that fully realises our vision of the Conduit world.”

“We truly hope when you finally get the chance to play the game that you like what you play, hear, and see,” he added.

We look forward to it! Conduit 2 releases for the Wii this autumn.