Conker spiritual successor ‘shelved for now’, says creator

Gory Detail has temporarily shelved its Conker’s Bad Fur Day spiritual successor to focus on a new game with broader appeal, it’s said.

The studio, which is comprised of Rare veterans Chris Seavor and Shawn Pile, had been teasing the Conker successor following the release of its 2018 puzzle game Rusty Pup.

“I think I could do something that is Conker in essence, but is actually something completely new, Seavor told GI.biz in November 2018.

“I’ve worked something out that people would see and think ‘I can see Conker’. There will be little characters that are a bit bizarre, with cartoon violence… comedy, but a lot darker.”

At the time, Seavor claimed he’d already got “a lot of the work” done in preparation for full development on the unnamed project.

As well as Conker, the game was set to take inspiration from Urchin, a dark fantasy project Seavor was building at Rare before its eventual cancellation.

However, speaking to VGC in August, he confirmed plans for the game have now been put on hold so that Gory Detail can focus on a different title.

“The good news is, there’s a new game in the pipe-works,” he said. “I’ve pretty much finished the concept and game loop, even have a good name for it… Now just the minor task of 1,000 graphic assets and a million lines of code to make it all work!”

He added: “Oh, and it’s not Project3… That’s shelved for now… Project4 has more broader appeal. Anyway, it will be a while before we’re ready to announce anything but happily it’s well suited to Early Access, so might be available to play earlier than you’d think.”

Seavor also dampened expectations for a Nintendo Switch port of Rusty Pup, the puzzle game which has already released for PC and iOS.

“I’ve lived and breathed Rusty Pup for nearly four years now, day in day out, so I needed a bit of a break to work on other things and the longer you leave something behind the more difficult it is to return to it,” he explained.

“Gory Detail doesn’t have the luxury of farming conversions to others, but it’s moot anyway as I wouldn’t trust anyone to get it just right.”