Bethesda gets Dishonored on 360, PS3, PC

Last year, Bethesda Softworks announced the acquisition of Arkane Studios, saying the developer was at work on its next project, with details like genre, platforms, and release date to be revealed at a later day. That day was today, as the publisher confirmed those details--but little else--for its upcoming game Dishonored.

Set for a 2012 release on the Xbox 360, PlayStation 3, and PC, Dishonored is a first-person action game. That sums up the information direct from Bethesda, but gamers can look forward to more details being revealed in the August issue of Game Informer, which features Dishonored on the cover.

According to a teaser for the issue, Dishonored is, "a game about assassination where you don't have to kill anyone. It's a game about infiltration where you can set up traps and slaughter the entire garrison of an aristocrat's mansion rather than sneak in. It's a game about brutal violence where you can slip in and out of a fortified barracks with nobody ever knowing you were there. It's a game about morality and player choice where the world you create is based on your actions, not navigating conversation trees."

Dishonored development is being guided by studio co-creative directors Raphael Colantonio and Harvey Smith. Colantonio was lead designer and director on Arkane's first title, the critically acclaimed 2002 role-playing game Arx Fatalis, while Smith made his name as lead designer for Ion Storm's influential first-person action game Deus Ex and went on to serve as creative director for Midway Austin on Blacksite: Area 51.

Beyond Arx Fatalis, Arkane also handled the original PC version of Ubisoft's Dark Messiah of Might and Magic, which debuted to a tepid reception in 2006. More recently, Arkane assisted 2K Marin with the single-player campaign for last year's well-regarded BioShock 2.