Frogwares says "a new story is being told" with Project Palianytsia

Frogwares has announced that it is working on a new game, codenamed Project Palianytsia, which will be a horror and mystery game which fans of The Sinking City and Sherlock Holmes will like.

Frogwares has shared an update about how the war has required the studio to adapt its plans, and announced that a "new story is being told" with Project Palianytsia.

Frogwares new game screenshots

"To be frank, 'Palianytsia' is not the project we had originally planned on doing next, but with the war taking place, we needed to re-evaluate everything. It is a bit more streamlined than our latest open-world titles but it’s a game we are sure we can deliver under these extreme circumstances," Frogwares says. "As an independent studio, we always have to balance our resources and workflow to be able to deliver our games. But the war has thrown notable hurdles at us and our established process. Constant communication and iteration between teams is harder to maintain, so we need a project where staff can have more autonomy. Roles and responsibilities had to shift around to fill the gaps left by those who signed up to fight or provide humanitarian aid. And the threat that tomorrow something could happen somewhere or to someone that would force us to drastically adapt all over again means we need to be more flexible."

We should see a "proper" announcement soon. We're also told that Palianytsia is a "mix of eldritch horror coupled with Victorian-era mystery," with Frogwares' communications manager Sergey Oganesyan adding, "We are revealing the game now in this way to simply show people we are pushing on and also as a clear middle finger to those who thought they could just roll into our country hoping to disrupt and ruin our lives." Oganesyan explains that the codename Palianytsia was partly chosen due to its being symbolic to Ukraine, and partly because "it’s also the equivalent of phonetical Dark Souls for Russians who often can’t pronounce it correctly when trying to pass off as Ukrainian. And so now it's often used in the field as a test to quickly identify possible affiliation of unknown individuals."

What do you think of Frogwares' announcement? Let us know in the comments!

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Written by Heidi Nicholas

Hey, I'm Heidi! I've just finished studying a Masters in English Literature, but I've been obsessed with gaming since long before then. I began on the PS2 with Spyro, before graduating to the Xbox 360 and disappearing into Skyrim. I'm now a loyal RPG fan, but I still like to explore other genres — when I'm not playing Assassin's Creed Odyssey, or being lured back into Red Dead Redemption 2 or The Witcher 3!