Cole? Is that you?
Courtesy of VideoGamer, a slice of former Team Bondi developers’ Whore of the Orient, the successor to police procedural drama L.A. Noire, has escaped onto the internet, where it’s expected to wreak havoc on an already fragile ecosyste … no, wait, I’m thinking of something else. Actually it’s expected to look a lot like L.A. Noire, and that’s because it does. Looking like L.A. Noire is no bad thing; Team Bondi’s homage to classic noir iconography had a lot going for it, even if it was flawed. Whether or not something quite so similar to Cole Phelps’ odyssey, set in a completely different location, will appeal to gamers is an open question.
Team Bondi didn’t survive long after the launch of L.A. Noire; accusations of bad working conditions and appalling money management trailed in its wake, but studio head Brendan McNamara found a home elsewhere and soon began work on his follow-up project. “It’s one of the great untold stories of the twentieth century,” McNamara said at the time, “so I think it’ll be good.” Unfortunately for him his luck with money followed him from Bondi, and had it not been for a bail-out from the Australian government things might have gone very badly for the fledgling title.
Aside from this snippet of gameplay, little is known about Whore of the Orient. It’s set in 1936 Shanghai, and it looks as though you’re playing a cop again, but there’s no hint as to whether the elaborately motion-captured interrogations that formed a core mechanic in L.A. Noire will also be part of this title. There’s no release date, and the only thing we know about platforms is that it’s supposed to be released for PC and next generation machines.
Source: VideoGamer
