Game Freak and Private Division team up for new AAA adventure game “Project Bloom”

Game Freak, the most popular Pokémon studio, is teaming up with Private Division for what looks to be their first big foray into the AAA action-adventure space.

Private Division has announced that it is working with Game Freak on Project Bloom, an “ambitious” new adventure game. In a statement, Game Freak director Kota Furushima said that fans can expect something completely different from the usual monster collecting fare.

Project Bloom is a new collaboration between Game Freak and Private Division. Image source: Special Section.

“We are delighted to have the opportunity to create a new intellectual property that is bold and very different from our previous work,” said Furushima. From the beginning, Private Division was the publisher we wanted to work with on our new game. Their proven track record and world-class experience give us full confidence to create a whole new adventure game that we can’t wait to share more of in the future. «

Special division head Michael Warsh added that the publisher was “honored” to be the first Western publisher to work with Game Freak.

Along with the announcement, Game Freak and Private Division included the first artwork for the new project, which features a samurai standing in a forest. The evocative visual, in which samurai pale in front of huge, twisted trees, suggests that the new game will have a greater scope than any of Game Freak’s projects to date.

Game Freak presents its next original game

While Game Freak is most commonly associated with Nintendo, it is still an independent studio that has produced games for various platforms over the years. They include Little Town Hero, Tembo the Badass Elephant, and Pocket Card Jockey, all of which have been released for platforms outside of the Nintendo Switch.

In a previous interview with IGN, Game Freak’s general manager of development management, 1 Masafumi Saito, spoke about the studio’s desire to work with “all kinds of creators both within Japan and in other parts of the world.”

“The departments responsible for developing original games are not limited by scale or platforms,” ​​Saito said at the time. “The most important thing is to create new games that attract users. We work on many small and large projects, regardless of the platform. Game Freak grew out of our experiences creating home video games independently, so we want to keep the focus on personal desire to try to create something new and one of a kind.”