There is a lot of chatter going on around last week's announcement by Intel that it is cancelling its Project Offset development. The reason this matters in the MMO space is that the only (that I know of) project to officially license that magnificent engine for a game is Red 5 Studios. Since I can not play Project Offset (unless Fractiv, the new company formed by the ejected devs is taking over the PO reigns... hope, hope, hope!) I am now squarely watching Red 5 to see if they can pull out a game of a quality to match the wonder I've seen from the Project Offset demos.

The reason this is less exciting to me is that Red 5 has recently been acquired (a "majority interest" technically,) by The9 in China. Yep... there has been a lot of attention paid by R5 over the years towards the specific catering to "the Asian market and what makes a game fun to play for their tastes." (That's a paraphrased quote pulled from 3 year-old memory, but I can't find the original interview.) Whether the game they're working on will be something I care to play is unclear, as they still have not announced what they're actually creating. One thing I imagine to be true is that it will look friggin' stunning.

Gamasutra also has some more background and quote-y text about Red 5's continuance: "Red 5's Offset Engine-Powered MMO Still On, Despite Offset Cancelation"