The Astronauts: 'first game is not a shooter', ex-Bulletstorm devs speak

Ex-Bulletstorm developers The Astronauts have confirmed that they are not making a shooter, but it will be an Unreal Engine 3 title, and it is due in 2013.

Eurogamer reports that a blog post on The Astronauts' official site clears up speculation, "Guys, we are not making a shooter," the post reads, in response to assumptions the team is making another Unreal Engine-based shoot 'em-up. "Let us repeat that: we are not making a shooter."

"And it's actually silly to talk about 'yet another Unreal Engine game' when some of the best, most unique games in the world are made with exactly that particular tech (Bioshock, Mass Effect, Dishonored, etc.)"

The team is not working with ex-Epic dev Cliff Bleszinski, nor is it going down the Kickstarter route, the blog post continued, "Kickstarter is not just a fantastic funding platform, but also a highly effective marketing tool (whether we like it or not). But we would have a hard time explaining our first game to the public without having it half done already."

"It's one thing to get people excited about a remake or a sequel of the game they loved in the past (nothing wrong with that!), and it's another to get significant following for the project that's kind of hard to compare to anything else out there."

"Not that we're doing a crazy, experimental game no one ever thought of, but still, we feel it's unique. In the end, we have decided to use our life savings and self-fund the studio. It's very risky, but if our families believe in us, why shouldn't we?"

What do you think? Are you happy to see these guys branching out? Let us know below.