Judas is coming off its biggest playtest, and a significant development milestone, Villainy, is now complete. Throughout the Mayflower, players will encounter three leaders – Tom, Queen Nefertiti and Hope, known as the Big 3. While you can ally with them, ignoring one will turn them into the villain who gains new abilities as they make life more difficult.

One example is the Rent-A-Deputy, a mechanized anthropomorphic horse, who can fight against you if Tom is annoyed. Interestingly, there is “more dangerous and character-specific stuff” that will remain secret “for now.”

Levine cites the Nemesis system from Middle-earth: Shadow of Mordor as a “personal favorite,” but unlike the Orcs, you’ll get far closer to the Big 3 in Judas. “We want losing one of them to feel like losing a friend. We want to play with that dynamic, and we want that choice to be super hard. The Big 3 are all going to be competing for your favor and attention.

“They can bribe you, save you in battle, talk shit about the other characters, and share with you their darkest secrets. But eventually, you’ve got to decide who you trust and who you don’t.” Of course, they’ll be watching throughout and sharing their thoughts about how you play.

Judas is in development for Xbox Series X/S, PS5, and PC, but there’s still no release date. Levine says the team isn’t ready to finalize an exact date yet, especially since they have “a way of slipping by, and we’d like to avoid having to change the date after we announce it.” Stay tuned for more details and development updates in the meantime.

Interestingly, Levine considers BioShock to be more of a “corridor” from a development standpoint. “BioShock, if you look at it from a development standpoint – and this may be a bit alienating to some readers – but it’s basically a corridor.

“A very, very long corridor with a bunch of trigger points that make story elements happen. Judas is made very, very differently and that makes it much more hopefully reflective of players’ agency, but also much, much harder to make.”

Judas will seemingly differ by observing players and commenting on their actions at points. “Even just characters observing a long range of player action and commenting on it. ‘Hey, you saw this, and you did that, and then you did this, and that was interesting because that caused that’ – we’re doing that kinda stuff right now.”

Naturally, it’s a “huge amount of work” when considering all the potential decisions. There’s also having to write “in-character responses for different characters to those actions in a way that feels organic.”

Judas is in development for Xbox Series X/S, PS5, and PC. Set in a spaceship, the story focuses on the titular protagonist’s attempt to escape. Of course, circumstances can change depending on your actions, especially when attempting to work alongside other crew members. Head here for more details.

Though it doesn’t have a release date, parent company Take-Two Interactive said it’s expected to launch by March 2025. Stay tuned for updates.

A lot of the game’s narrative seems to focus on four characters—the protagonist Judas, head of security Tom, Dr. Okiki/Nefertiti, and ship counselor Hope. The dynamics between these characters serves as what has been described by creative director Ken Levine as “narrative LEGOs”, which will allow players to experience the story in a more modular and non-linear way.

On the gameplay side of things, Judas seems to bear quite a resemblance to Levine’s previous title, BioShock. Players will be able to make use of traditional weaponry like guns, as well more interesting abilities at the same time. They can also use their abilities in more creative ways, like shooting a puddle of water with electricity to electrify all enemies standing in it.

Judas doesn’t yet have a solid release date. The game is going to come to PC, PS5, and Xbox Series X/S some time in 2025.

The Game Awards host and creator Geoff Keighley said on Twitter that Levine’s “vision” would be revealed on March 26th. There will also be a “long-form chat” with Keighley and IGN’s Ryan McCaffrey, the latter confirming an interview on IGN at 9 AM PT.

Judas is coming to Xbox Series X/S, PS5 and PC. It’s set in a futuristic space city called Mayflower, governed by computers that control human behavior. As the titular protagonist, players deviate from the norm, causing a revolution and making choices that directly after the story.

Like BioShock, players can wield a weapon in their right hand and utilize various skills with their left in combat. Stay tuned for more information later today.

A couple of weeks ago I had the chance to play 5 hour of JUDAS in Boston.

JUDAS is the new game from Ken @Levine and @GhostStoryGames, revealed at @TheGameAwards 2022.

Tomorrow you'll hear more about Ken's vision – including a long-form chat with me and @DMC_Ryan pic.twitter.com/4iPS70RTNH

— Geoff Keighley (@geoffkeighley) March 25, 2024

Last week I flew to Boston to play 6 hours of Judas, and then @geoffkeighley, who joined me, and I interviewed @levine for over an hour about the long wait since BioShock Infinite, Judas's bold narrative bet, and more.

The full interview drops on IGN tomorrow at 9am PT/12pm ET! pic.twitter.com/qT7uTLZlJt

— Ryan McCaffrey (@DMC_Ryan) March 25, 2024

Judas is set in the sci-fi city of Mayflower, which is described as a “spacefaring city” ruled by machines who “control every aspect of business, art, and government.” Under their rule, Mayflower’s citizens are all trained to spy on one another and are always on the lookout for the opportunity to “tear each other apart for the slightest offense.”

Players will play as the eponymous protagonist Judas, who “sparked a devastating revolution” against the city’s leaders to “tear it all down”, following which it will fall to you to decide whether you will “fix what you broke or leave it all to burn.”

As that might suggest, choice-and-consequence mechanics will also play a crucial role in Judas, where the actions you take will shape the outcome of the story. “What if you could choose between who to befriend and who to stab in the back?” Levine wrote. “With Judas, we wanted to craft an experience where these decisions and how the story unfolds is up to you. Because you, as Judas, are the driver of every event in a story with a new cast of characters to get to know — and change — in ways you haven’t experienced before in our games.”

Judas is in development for PS5, Xbox Series X/S, and PC. It doesn’t yet have a release date, but Ghost Story Games’ parent company Take-Two Interactive has previously said it’s expected to release by March 2025.

Featuring the protagonist going through video logs, the trailer also gives us a glimpse at some of the levels in the game. The trailer also shows off the game’s lineage, as much in the style of BioShock, the game will allow players to make use of magical abilities alongside their weapons.

Judas is being worked on by a team at Ghost Story Games and is headed up by Ken Levine, who is known for creating the BioShock franchise, among other things. The game was announced back in 2022, and is currently slated for a release by March 2025.

The game is slated to be an immersive sim, in line with the aforementioned Levine’s history on working on classic titles like Thief and System Shock. Judas is currently in development for PC, PS5, and Xbox Series X/S.

This was followed several minutes later by Xbox Era co-founder Nick Baker hinting at the appearance of Rise of the Ronin, Death Stranding 2, Silent Hill 2 and Judas, among other titles. He indicates that this will all happen “on the 31st (roughly)”, adding further fuel to the slowly building fire of rumors.

It’s worth noting that this follows a report from notable leaker billbil-kun on January 23rd, stating that Death Stranding 2 would receive a new trailer within 15 days. That falls within the timeline of the rumored State of Play. The sequel’s official title will also allegedly be revealed as Death Stranding 2: On the Beach.

Coupled with the photo of creator Hideo Kojima editing what seems to be a new Death Stranding 2 trailer a few months ago, an announcement could be inbound sooner than later. Stay tuned for more details in the meantime.

Revision time: sounding better than it did last week.

— NateTheHate2 (@NateTheHate2) January 28, 2024

On the 31st (roughly), Ronins will Rise, we’ll die stranded, have a rebirth and Kojima will fulfil his dream. Sonic will live in the shadow of his generation while the hills will remain silent until the dawn when you’ll need to catch the metro. Just don’t be a Judas about it.

— Balatro Nick  (@Shpeshal_Nick) January 28, 2024

“We did have some slippage in the last few years,” said Take-Two CEO Strauss Zelnick to IGN when asked about potential delays affecting this release schedule.

“We feel really stable right now. I feel great about our upcoming schedule. Of course there’s always the possibility of some slippage but the teams seem to be functioning really well and I’m optimistic about delivering great titles to the marketplace on an ongoing basis.”

Judas was originally unveiled during The Game Awards 2022. It is slated to be an immersive sim, referencing Levine’s history of working on titles like Thief and System Shock. The game got a trailer back in December which shows off some in-engine gameplay.

Judas is currently in development for PC, PS5, and Xbox Series X/S. Despite its March 2025 release window, the game doesn’t yet have any solid release date.

Judas is a first person immersive sim that Ghost Story Games describes as a single player narrative-driven game. The trailer is brief, but shows some impressive in-engine gameplay, while the game’s unique visual aesthetic also catches the eye. Check out the trailer below.

Judas is in development for PS5, Xbox Series X/S, and PC. There’s no word on when it will be announced, but Levine said earlier this year that the game wouldn’t be announced until it was relatively close to launch, so take from that what you will. Reports in June also claimed that Ghost Story Games’ debut title was facing development issues behind the scenes- read more on that through here.

Well, it seems we have more news in regards to that yet unannounced game, this time from Ken Levine himself. Speaking with the Arcade Attack in an interview (via WCCFTech), Levine talks about various topics, mostly in regards to his career and previous games. One thing he did confirm is that the game he is working on right now will be revealed only when it is nearing completion and is closer to launch, as he did not want to show it too early.

Levine says: “We didn’t want to go down the path of showing [the game] too early, because we thought it was going to be out sooner, and I don’t want to have a long period of having a build-up, interest, and hype because it just doesn’t, it would end up feeling fairly inauthentic and I think that gamers want to be… they want to know what they’re getting, and the only way to do that really is to announce closer to launch.”

Levine also says that the announcement of the game will make people “surprised but unsurprised by what they see”, and that he is not involved in the next BioShock game, wishing well to the developers of that title.

This comes days after a report published by Bloomberg, in which several current and former Ghost Story Games employees – speaking under anonymity – talked about how the studio’s debut game is going through developmental troubles because of Levine’s management and auteurism. For now, it seems like we have to wait quite a while to get any sort of info into Ghost Story Games’ upcoming title.