Project 007 will tell the origin story of gaming’s very own James Bond

Project 007, the upcoming James Bond game in the works from Hitman creators IO Interactive, will be an origin story separate from the 007 films.

Project 007 details are still quite scarce, but a recent interview with IO Interactive's co-owners has given us our first juicy piece of intel: Project 007 will be a James Bond origin story with no connection to the movies. It raises some interesting questions about just how this version of Bond might be portrayed, but we're confident if any studio can nail a new James Bond and land him in one of the best action-adventure games on PS5, it's Hitman developers IO Interactive.

Video games to get their very own James Bond.

Project 007 will make James bond "his own game character," says IO co-owners

With Project 007 letting James Bond take over for Hitman full-time over at IO, there's a confidence behind this upcoming game's development we don't hear about very often. The only problem is we know so little about Project 007 — although thankfully a recent Eurogamer interview with IO co-owners Christian Elverdam and Hakan Abrak has helped fill in some of the initial blanks.

Speaking about the driving inspiration behind the new James Bond game, Elverdam said: "We're doing an origin [story], because one thing, to show the trust [Eon Productions, the Bond license holders] instilled in us, is that we're allowed to build a James Bond for the games [audience], which I think is a profound homage to where our industry is and where the medium is, in the sense that yes, it's time to have a James Bond character who was not a movie character but who's comfortably just his own game character."

Despite being the star of one of the best-selling video game franchises ever, James Bond has only made three game appearances that were not directly tied to one of the movies. The very first James Bond game, Shaken but not Stirred for the ZX Spectrum; 007 James Bond: The Stealth Affair, which was a reskinned version of Operation Stealth starring John Glames; and James Bond Jr., which was based on the 90s cartoon show. That last effort was in 1991, so needless to say, the video game medium might be overdue its own richly rendered take on 007.

IO's Abrak seems to believe the same: "It's something that can stand next to the TV and the movies and whatnot. This can be something where the gamers say, 'Well it's not just a gamification of a video [and] did they convey Daniel Craig well or not? I don't know, let me look at the pixels.' It's an origin story. It's the beginning of something new and it's the beginning, hopefully, of something that the gamers can call their own."

Blood Stone's Bond jumps to mind here.

The Daniel Craig comparison does raise an interesting possibility, however: will Project 007 model its James Bond on a real-life actor? Or will IO fabricate Bond's appearance, giving our beloved medium an action hero who could stand toe-to-toe with the likes of Uncharted's Nathan Drake and Tomb Raider's Lara Croft?

Here's hoping IO Interactive have more to share with us soon. In the meantime, let us know if this is sounding like your ideal James Bond game, and whether you think it has the makings of one of the best PS5 games, down in the comments below.

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Written by Lee Brady

Staff Writer Lee loves to write about classic PS1 games on PS Plus, examining the game design of upcoming PS5 games like Marvel's Spider-Man 2 and Like a Dragon Ishin, and his shameless love of Sonic, Final Fantasy, and Kingdom Hearts games. He's also your resident PlayStation Stars guy.