Ex-Battlefield Devs Open New Studio, Reveal PC RPG

Former Battlefield developers David Goldfarb and Ben Cousins have announced The Outsiders, a new Stockholm-based independent studio. The company's first project is an untitled role-playing game that is aiming to launch for PC and possibly other systems later.

Cousins, formerly an independent games consultant, will serve as CEO of The Outsiders while Goldfarb takes on the role of Chief Creative Officer.

Goldfarb, who served as Battlefield 3's lead designer at DICE, quit the company in the summer of 2012 to join Payday developer Overkill Software. He left that company last summer, at the time explaining that he was finished with AAA game development.

"I've been working on this concept for a long time," Goldfarb told Eurogamer about this new game. He explained that the new title represents his first official stab at RPG development, though he has played around with some RPG elements and concepts in past games.

"I've loved RPGs all my life and have been shoehorning elements of them into games I've made over the years with lesser or more success," he said.

Official details about The Outsiders' first game are being kept under wraps for now, but Goldfarb did tease that the title is likely to offer a dynamic story as opposed to a clearly spelled out structure.

"I'm interested in systemic story stuff. I know Ken [Levine] has recently been talking about this," he said. "I have another way I want to try and do it. But I think it won't be a game of cutscenes."

"If the guys at Naughty Dog want to go do that--and they're superb at what they craft--then that's awesome. I would rather find the stories that exist in... people use the sports analogy a lot, but when you play Madden, for example. The dream is to combine some of that with some of this."

What are you hoping to see from The Outsiders? Let us know in the comments below!