Charles Cecil doesn't want to call Beyond a Steel Sky a sequel

"I'm going to assume that nobody who plays this game has ever played Beneath a Steel Sky," he explained when we talked to him.

The first release of Beneath a Steel Sky came all the way back in 1994, and with Beyond a Steel Sky coming from Revolution Software, we were eager to hear more about this title from founder and CEO Charles Cecil, who doesn't actually want to call it a sequel.

"Okay, so I don't even want to call this a sequel, because I'm going to assume that nobody who plays this game has ever played Beneath a Steel Sky," he explained. "So this is within the same universe, but the gameplay is so completely different. The original was a 320x200 point-and-click - this is much more ambitious. This is a full 3D world, but very much based on the idea of core adventure puzzles built on top of pillars."

These pillars include the Virtual Theatre system that Cecil dives into, adapting the same ideas from the original game but taking them a step further. He also talks about the difference when it comes to puzzle-solving, moving on from the trial and error approach of older games like the Monkey Island series:

"What we want is games that are ultimately logical, which means that the player should be able to work them out, and the nice thing about the Virtual Theatre system is that the more that they explore the world, the more the solutions should emerge from their investigation."

Are you excited to return to this universe?