New Turok to be Unreal-powered

In the midst of the marginally controlled chaos that was E3 2005, Buena Vista Games announced it had acquired the rights to the Turok game franchise from Classic Media, the owner of its comic book inspiration. While Turok's main claim to fame was a string of first-person shooters from the now-defunct publisher Acclaim, the famed dinosaur hunter was actually created in 1954 by author Matthew H. Murphy. The last Turok game published was 2002's Turok: Evolution for the Xbox, GameCube, PlayStation 2, and Game Boy Advance.

Given Buena Vista's statements that the next Turok game would be released for next-generation consoles, there was much speculation about which tools the game's developer, the recently founded Propaganda Games, would use. This week that mystery was dispelled with BVG's announcement that it has licensed Epic Games' ever-popular Unreal Engine 3 for "multiple next-generation BVG projects," including the next Turok.

"Licensing Unreal Engine 3 is a strategic move to provide cost-effective and timely delivery of new content, allowing our development teams to leverage the enormous capabilities of emerging next-generation systems," said Michael Ryder, BVG's vice president of worldwide production.

Unsurprisingly, Mark Rein, vice president and cofounder of Epic Games, had similarly nice things to say about his new partner. "BVG has some awesome IP to work with and we feel privileged to contribute to its success," he said.

GameSpot will have more on the next-gen Turok as soon as details--such as a specific platform--are announced.