Heretics Kingdom 2: Revealed?

Found on Chris Bateman’s blog, in the middle of his Where Next With CRPGs entry:

We’re still working with 3D People, and a new Heretic Kingdoms game is in the works. For this one, we’re working on it from the beginning, so we are able to attempt much more. We’re keeping several of the factors that worked well in the first one, such as the simplified healing system, and the Attunement system - although the latter is being improved. The new system is broken into streams of development - it gives the player greater control over how and which Attunements the player learns. In effect, it provides a bespoke class system which the player has control over.

One thing that we’re taking a step backwards on is the character attributes. In the first game, we wanted to keep it as simple as possible. But one thing has become apparent from post-release feedback - the core audience (which is inevitably a Hardcore audience) for these games actually enjoy a little bit of the “spreadsheet full of numbers” - perhaps because it allows them to identify the character in an easy to understand fashion. So we’re providing more of a conventional attribute system, although it will remain simple and accessible.

The next Heretic Kingdoms game will have an open world. We always wanted it for the first game, but it was always going to be too expensive. This time, we can make it happen. The linear structure has its place, but it’s nice to be able to offer the player a world to explore. And similarly, we’re able to give the player more choice as to their starting character. There should be a choice of gender at the very least. We’re also exploring ways to make the world more dynamic… I shouldn’t say too much about this, because at the moment we can’t be sure which elements of this will work.

This, of course, is far from being an official announcement, and the game would still be a good year away or even more than that, but still, it’s something.