Lords of the Fallen 2 Loses Producer, Changes Direction to Reach Bigger Audience

Changes are afoot with Lords of the Fallen 2. The game's executive producer has announced plans to leave the development team, while the game itself is appears to be changing directions.

In a Facebook post Thursday, Tomasz Gop announced his forthcoming departure from Polish developer CI Games. "I will be leaving CI Games not long from now," he wrote, adding that he's actively looking for a new job.

CI Games released a statement in Polish, as translated by Eurogamer, thanking Gop for his input on Lords of the Fallen 2. However, the company explained, "We have different visions for further development of the series and Tomasz will not be a part of CI Games' progress."

CI Games went to say that Lords of the Fallen 2 aims to "reach a wider audience" than the first game, which sold hundreds of thousands of copies and was ultimately profitable. Part of the way CI Games hopes to do that is through narrative.

"We're building a richer story," the developer said. "We're aware that these aspects could've been better in first game, so the story is a big point of the sequel, along with a robust fighting system. We want to bring something fresh to RPG games."

Lords of the Fallen 2 is expected to enter full production later this year; writer Jess Lebow, who is the lead designer for CI Games' Sniper: Ghost Warrior 3, is in charge of the game's story. The game's creative director is Paul Robinson, a former US Marine who also worked on Killzone 2; he is also the creative director for Ghost Warrior 3.

In addition to Lords of the Fallen 2, CI Games is working on a Lords of the Fallen mobile game.

The original Lords of the Fallen, which was often compared to the Dark Souls franchise, launched last fall for consoles and PC and enjoyed a generally positive critical reception. The original Lords of the Fallen developer, Deck 13, is working with Focus Home Interactive on a new Xbox One/PC/PS4 RPG called the Surge.