Award-winning game designer and writer Ken Levine, known for his work on System Shock 2 and the BioShock franchise, talked about the similarities and differences of those games with his next title, Judas, currently in development at Ghost Story Games.
In a video interview published this week by YouTuber MrMattyPlays, Levine claimed that while there are familiar elements (such as dual-wielding powers and weapons), Judas will be radically different in many ways. He also said it can be considered somewhere between BioShock and the first System Shock, meaning it's more complex and offers greater player expression and depth than the most recent BioShock titles.
There are parts of Judas that are more similar to Bioshock, and there are parts of Judas that are really, really radically different and it's nice to have some things that you're familiar with. I'm sure people noticed there's a gun in one hand and you got powers in the other hand. We have an additional hacking thing which we haven't shown off that much, but the way the game works and the way the game is populated and the way you choose between these relationships is something we've never ever done before. The way the world is decorated, the way encounters come in, the way you choose paths in the game, those are all so radically different. The way the story is delivered, too. It was good to start with some basis, but this is probably the biggest radical departure we've made since, you know, since I did BioShock. This is more of a departure in some ways than BioShock was to System Shock 2.
Judas is sort of somewhere between BioShock and System Shock, not between BioShock and System Shock 2, in terms of its depth. It's just a bigger game and a more complex game, but it's in service of doing something we started in BioShock Infinite, which is really how do you build a relationship with characters in games that feels way more granular than you normally see in games where you're really just making a few big choices, but really low-level reaction and commentary, being able to play people off of each other and feeling people getting angry at you and then being able to pull them back from the edge of that anger to and then maybe piss somebody off at the same time. That was what we're most interested in. Also, Infinite felt a little light to me on player expression, so we went back a little more towards player expression and build depth.
Levine first discussed the 'narrative LEGOs' concept around ten years ago. It wasn't until The Game Awards 2022 that Ghost Story Games unveiled Judas as its debut project, but fans had to wait until March 2024 to get a lot more info from the man in a massive 75-minute interview featuring Geoff Keighley, Ryan McCaffrey, and Levine himself.
In late August, Ghost Story Games shared the first developer log on Steam, confirming that work had finished on the Villainy feature that will ensure emergent gameplay between the player and the game's three potential villains:
When you play BioShock or BioShock Infinite, the villain is always going to be the villain. Fontaine, Comstock — they’re always going to be the bad guys. In Judas, your actions will attract members of the Big 3 to you as friends. But ignore one of them enough, and they become the VILLAIN. From there, they will get access to a new suite of powers to subvert your actions and goals.
Judas still has no official release date, but Take-Two Interactive CEO Strauss Zelnick included it in the company's 2026 lineup.
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