Splash Damage, the studio behind Gears Tactics, said in March that it was developing a new game exclusively for Stadia that would be "a little different" from previous ones. The project was officially announced today and will be released exclusively for Stadia as Outcasters, a multiplayer isometric shooter for up to eight players.

Outcasters is clearly different in many ways from Splash Damage's previous games: "Quake Wars," "Brink," and "Dirty Bomb," as well as "Doom 3," "Gears of War 4," and "Halo: The Master Chief Collection's multiplayer component, but it remains rooted in "a love of multiplayer, a love of shooters," studio co-founder and CEO Richard Jolley said in an interview.

"If you look at 'Outcaster' on the surface, you'd think, 'This doesn't look like anything Splash Damage has done before.' But if you look at the sort of purist roots of the multiplayer shooter competition, I think it brings a great deal of that mechanic to the table.

This new project grew out of Splash Damage's first game jam, held in between projects. It has obviously changed quite a bit since its inception, but one thing that hasn't changed is the ability to curve the shot after firing by clicking and dragging the mouse.

"This notion that there is a way for the enemy to attack you even when you are behind cover was actually a very interesting experience," says Jolly.

"I thought I had been playing this mode for about half an hour, but by the time I left the office it was eleven o'clock. That's when I obviously knew I was onto something.

Outcaster will be available in two modes: a free-for-all "Last Caster Standing" and an objective-based mode called "Gold Rush," in which teams compete to collect and deposit gold coins within a time limit. Product lead Lily Zhu said that, like other Splash Damage games, the game will offer players a high degree of customization, allowing them to personalize their looks, sounds, and abilities to bring to a match. And like Jolie, she stressed that while the game may not look like a traditional Splash Damage game, the studio's core priorities and goals have not changed.

"We innovate with our shooting mechanics, we innovate with the art style we choose, we innovate with the platforms we choose. For us, there is definitely a feeling of going beyond our comfort zone. "For us, it's about championing friendship through multiplayer gaming: ...... We just want people to have fun together. This is one of those things."

Jolly said that Stadia believes that digital distribution has the potential to bring about a seismic shift in gaming, comparable to the impact it has had on physical game sales. 'It's going to change the way games are consumed, and on YouTube, a lot of gaming content is consumed through viewing,' he said. So if there's the potential for new genres of games to come out of that platform in a way that hasn't been possible before, I think that's exciting for us."

Google sees similar potential in Outcasters as a game that is, as Stadia's Nico Zettler describes it, "very easy to watch. It's "a perfect match for the diversity of our platform, and for YouTube as well. Yes, it was definitely the idea on our part to make this a very watchable and great looking game that would appeal to a very wide and diverse range of players. "

Outcasters will be released in the fall. Until then, you can follow the action on Discord.

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