Quantic Dream: No Guns on Our Game’s Cover

Beyond: Two Souls is one of the most intriguing projects in gaming right now. Featuring Ellen Page (in both voice and motion), the game circles around a young girl with supernatural powers who is hunted by evil forces (I think). Quantic Dream, the game’s developer, has gone on the record about wanting to present a mature, emotional narrative unlike anything that’s been done in games before.

This focus on doing things differently apparently caused the studio to “categorically refuse” concept box art featuring Ellen Page holding a gun. Here’s executive producer Guillaume de Fondaumière:

“We have to be very careful. We're working closely with the marketing folks at Sony to portray the game in the right light, to be able to talk to that diverse audience that we hope we will be able to reach with Beyond.”

He added, somewhat sexist-ly:

“Indeed, there is some action in Beyond. But if we, for instance, put a pack art that's solely featuring action, first of all it's not going to be truthful to what the game is and then, your wife for instance, is not going to feel attracted to this. She'll say 'Ok, well that's not unique, it's one of your video games.’”

“It's kind of natural for agencies, you know, who are far away from the project, to pitch you different things. 'It's a video game? Okay, it needs to have a gun otherwise it's not even a game.' But our job, with David [Cage], is to make sure that everyone understands what is specific about this game and to make sure that we have the right pack shot, and the right imagery supporting the project, and the right image is being communicated to the public.”

You can read the full interview over at Gamespot. Looks like Quantic Dream is serious about presenting Beyond as a completely new experience, and not something developed for the FPS-loving masses. We’ll just have to see how that works out.

And now, for some new news on Irrational Games.

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