Banned Bionicle Game Officially Transformed Into New Action RPG
Devs Who Created Bionicle Game Banned By Lego Reveal New Project
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Last year, a Bionicle fan game, Bionicle: Masks of Power, received a cease-and-desist from Lego. Despite prior approval from the company, Lego forced the team to shut down Masks of Power after eight years of hard work.
Undeterred, Team Kanohi, as it was then known, vowed to "take everything we’ve learned through creating Masks of Power and using that knowledge and experience as the foundation of a brand-new, original game."
True to their word, after rebranding to Unmasked Games, the first trailer for its new action RPG, Rustbound, has been revealed.
Bionicle: Masks Of Power Developers Reveal First Original Title, Rustbound
We spoke to the team behind Bionicle: Masks of Power following its sudden cease-and-desist last year. They told us that between 50 and 60 people had contributed their time to the game, with Jordan Willis, the studio's founder, starting at just 12-years-old.
The team adhered to Lego's‘Fair-Play Policy’, never planning to make a dime on the title, admitting they did it justfor the love of Bionicle. The news that Unmasked Games had to shutter the project was heartbreaking for the team, but it vowed to "stay in the fight," and Rustbound was born. Within the last few hours, it received its first trailer.
Details on Rustbound are limited, with Unmasked Games describing it as "an action RPG set in an entirely original world." The characters seen in the footage somewhat resemble Bionicles; however, they have been altered enough to make them legally distinct. We presume.
While some of the work is likely to be entirely new, in our interview, creative director Garrett Beelow told me that "there are a lot of assets that have nothing to do with Bionicle that we can keep. And there's also like a pretty big opportunity for us to make something awesome and kind of have this just kind of be part of our story," which is likely what we are seeing here.
With Lego being such sticklers with its IP, this may be the closest thing we get to a new Bionicle game. And while it's likely still some way off, to see such progress in a little over a year is exciting.