Scottish game developer Ruffian Games was officially acquired by Rockstar Games and renamed to Rockstar Dundee earlier this month, as spotted by crafty Internet sleuths on UK’s Companies House website.
Ruffian Games has actually been working on Rockstar Games projects for the last year or so, though we don’t really know which ones. Maybe Rockstar will acknowledge the acquisition with a press release now that it has been publically discovered and divulge more information on what the studio is doing right now, though it’s just as likely they won’t, given how secretive Rockstar generally is with the development of its games.
What we do know for a fact is that Grand Theft Auto V is being remade for next-gen, featuring ‘a range of technical improvements, visual upgrades and performance enhancements to take full advantage of the latest hardware, making the game more beautiful and more responsive than ever’. The projected release window is the second half of 2021 when GTA Online is also set to receive additional content exclusive to next-gen consoles and PC.
Of course, it is believed that Rockstar is also working on Grand Theft Auto VI, even though no official announcements have been made yet.
As a reminder, Ruffian Games was founded in April 2008 by former Realtime Worlds employees. The studio released its first game, Crackdown 2, in July 2010 as an Xbox 360 exclusive. Over the years, the company continued to work alongside other first-party Microsoft studios on projects such as Kinect Playfit, Kinect Star Wars, Nike + Kinect Training, Kinect Sesame Street TV, Kinect Sports Rivals, Halo: The Master Chief Collection, and Crackdown 3. They’ve also developed and self-published the multiplayer twin-stick shooter Fragmental and the hot-seat multiplayer VR party game RADtv for PC; these are available for purchase on Steam and 10% off if you get them both.