Reef Entertainment has confirmed it has agreed an exclusive deal with the UK Developer Rebellion to launch their 2000 AD character Rogue Trooper® videogame globally on Wii™.

For those who don’t know the character, Rogue Trooper® is a genetically engineered soldier of the future, and is unique in videogames as he has an distinct armoury; a rifle, helmet and backpack, which contain the ‘personalities’ of his fallen comrades, providing him the capabilities of 4 soldiers in one. A ‘biochip’ is installed within each ‘Genetic Infantryman’ or ‘GI’ from birth which then records their personalities and training upon their death. These biochips are then removed and can then be inserted within energized slots on a fellow GI’s rifle, helmet or backpack to secure them for their return to base and re-cloning.

Rogue Trooper®: The Quartz Zone Massacre is the story of how Rogue Trooper® and his comrades are betrayed by a traitor general on their first mission to an area on Nu Earth known as the Quartz Zone. Only Rogue survives, and joined by his fallen comrades within his equipment, he begins a journey across Nu Earth to find the general and unleash his revenge!

Rogue Trooper® is one of the 2000 AD’s most endearing characters. First appearing in 1981, he was created by Gerry Finlay-Day and Dave Gibbons of Watchmen fame and was intended to run only a few years, but fans continually demanded more adventures. Rogue Trooper® has also enjoyed many reincarnations as a videogame throughout the last 20 years, most recently as the critically acclaimed and BAFTA nominated 3rd person shooter on PS2, Xbox and PC.

The Wii version promises to provide even greater immersive gameplay with the unique Wii control interface where kill shots are more accurate and certainly more creative than its console forebears.

In addition, Rebellion has provided additional tweaks and polish to the overall game so ensuring the Wii version of the game is the very best yet.

Peter Rezon, CEO of Reef said; ‘Rogue Trooper®:The Quartz Zone Massacre is one of the best games Reef has been involved with, and to win this contract for the Wii version is fantastic. Were taking a hit game to a unique console where we believe the exciting elements we’ve added will make this 3rd shooter a hugely successful Wii title.’

Rogue Trooper®: The Quartz Zone Massacre will be released in Q4 2008

With the DEVELOP 100 published earlier today, Rebellion has achieved its long-term aim following global hits such as The Simpsons Game and Star Wars Battlefront: Renegade Squadron by becoming
Europe’s No.1 Independent Developer.

Jason Kingsley, CEO and Creative Director said,”Rebellion has been in this business for 16 years and never once have we tired of striving to develop innovative, exciting and above all, quality games.
Our successes in 2007/8 have been the culmination of product focus, fantastic publisher relationships, inward investment and recruiting the very best people in the business. Now we’ve reached No.1 in Europe, please don’t expect us to slow down!”

Chris Kingsley, CTO adds, “Overall, 2007/8 could be called our best years so far, but we have a number of projects fully underway which we believe will push Rebellion even higher in the rankings, so there’s definitely more to come!”

The Simpsons™ Game		Star Wars Battlefront®: Renegade Squadron

Rebellion, the UK Super-Developer, has had one of its most successful starts to any year during its 15-year history with all 3 of its recent PSP products enjoying Top 10 UK chart status.

The Simpsons Game with EA, Aliens Vs. Predator: Requiem with Sierra and Star Wars: Renegade Squadron with LucasArts have secured No. 1, 8 & 10 positions respectively. Not only that, Rebellion has produced the lion’s share of The Simpsons Game formats including Wii and PS2, which have maintained their Top 10 chart positions throughout January.

Jason Kingsley CEO and Creative Director said, ‘Being Independent does allow a number of options in our approach to producing games. Using The Simpsons Game as an example, we produced a multi-format game of one of EA’s global IP’s within the designated time scale and on budget, due in most part, to our flexibility and in-house technology. Also, being an Independent meant we were respected by the brand owners and able to provide unbiased views and opinions throughout the development of the game which ultimately helped maintain its quality and direction. This is especially true when looking at the success of our other PSP games at the moment.’

Chris Kingsley CTO continued; ‘We have our own method of game development and we’re happy to say it is working wonderfully! Every one of our games released in 2007 went Top 10, a fact we’re very proud of. From the studio acquisitions, staff recruitment and restructuring which has been implemented year-on-year, all of our efforts are coming to fruition. Our next big step is the move to our purpose built studio in Oxford later this year. From there, our aim is to maintain the influx of new and exciting talent to our studios, build on our relationships with our partners and to complete our next-gen games for 2008 and 2009.’

Competition winner Jamie on right

To coincide with the European release of Free Running on PS2 and PSP, Rebellion and Reef Entertainment together with the Chief Marketing Office (CMO) in Rotterdam, Netherlands, have conducted the world’s biggest videogame projection on the Nedlloyd building in the City.

As part of Rotterdam’s ‘City of Architecture 2007’ event, the ‘Free Running Gameplay’ was the first prize for the lucky winner of regional heats leading up to the premiere on Saturday 14th April.

The Free Running videogame, launched across Europe on Friday 20th April, is based upon the extreme sport of Parkour, which featured in the recent James Bond movie ‘Casino Royale’.

Jason Kingsley, CEO of Rebellion said, ‘Associating Free Running with the Rotterdam ‘City of Architecture 2007’ event made perfect sense. The CMO are communicating Rotterdam as a youth orientated city and playing an urban-sport focused videogame on one of the City’s key buildings actively engages with and encourages the young people of Rotterdam to get involved with new and exciting projects. It was an opportunity not to be missed.’

Peter Rezon, CEO of Reef Entertainment said, ‘When we began to work with the CMO, the idea of the projection – on what turned out to be arguably the world’s biggest TV - worked well because of its unique environment. We’re really pleased with the results.’

The Nedlloyd building is one of the largest in Rotterdam, standing at over 20 floors, overlooking the main waterway and is at the centre of Rotterdam. The Free Running projection could be seen from over 5 miles away.

Eidos released some really impressive games in 2006, with Tomb Raider Legend and Hitman Blood Money both appearing high in our Games of the Year awards. They released another action game though; one that seemingly came out of nowhere. Rogue Trooper from Rebellion is based on the comic of the same name, and combined impressive production values with some brilliant AI, inventive game mechanics and superb fire-fights. It's quite common for a game to sneak onto store shelves without much press, but for a game of this quality to do so simply didn't do it justice.

http://www.pro-g.co.uk/features/games_of_the_year/27-12-2006-120-1.html?page=7

Rogue Trooper also made it 12th in their top 50 ahead of some big titles for 2006:

Rebellion, the UK Super Developer, has won the coveted ‘Best Developer – Greatest contribution to Independent Games Development in 2006’ award at this year’s TIGA Annual awards.

In addition to this enormous accolade, Rebellion won ‘Best Handheld/Console Game’ for Miami Vice on PSP.

Jason Kingsley, CEO and Creative Director said; ’2006 has been a fantastic year for us, and to win these awards is the perfect way to end the year. This year we’ve grown into one of the biggest independent studios in Europe with the integration of the famous Core Design and Strangelite studios, launched our second 2000 AD-based and double BAFTA-Nominated game Rogue Trooper, completed GUN: Showdown with Activision and most importantly Miami Vice with Vivendi, so it’s been a very exciting time to say the least!’

Chris Kingsley, CTO added; ‘We’ve grown significantly over the past 12 months, with many internal changes, but we’ve been continually focused on product quality, and especially on product innovation. 2006 has been an excellent year and to win the TIGA awards for Best Developer and Best Handheld/Console game is a great vote of confidence from our peers’.

Reef Entertainment, publisher of Rebellion’s new extreme sports franchise Free Running on PS2 and PSP has officially announced the game to an expectant market.

“This is a major coup for us” said Reef’s CEO Peter Rezon, “Free Running or Le Parkour, as it’s known in France, has been one of the fastest growing underground youth sports over the past two years, gaining massive popularity around the world.”

Peter Rezon continues, “With a breakout into the mainstream for it’s leading exponents and high profile recognition of the sport through films such as District 13, the new James Bond movie - Casino Royale and Madonna’s music video for her Number 1 single ‘Jump’, everyone is beginning to see just how exciting this sport is. We are expecting great things from the game.”

Rebellion acquired all rights to Free Running game along with the registered trademarks, through its acquisition of the former Core Design Studios in Derby from Eidos earlier in the year.

“We recognised the games potential immediately.” said Chris Kingsley CTO of Rebellion, “Coupled with the feedback we received from focus groups and leading lights from the sport itself reinforces our conviction that Free Running will be a huge success.”

Jason Kingsley CEO and Creative Director of Rebellion commented “Free Running is currently QA’s favourite game, which is a very good sign. Some players have described it as ‘Tony Hawks without the skateboard’ if we get anywhere near that level of success, we’ll be immensely pleased.”

In addition to featuring characters based on the leading free runners in Europe, Free Running has been developed with the help of the sports brand specialist Adidas. Their Free Running apparel and high fashion training shoes all feature in-game.