Sega teases announcement for next week (that could be a spiritual Theme Hospital successor)

It appears that Sega is getting ready to unveil something new next week: Earlier today, the publisher tweeted an image of a light bulb, with the date "16th January" stenciled beside it. A great mystery indeed! 

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Except it's not, at least not entirely. PCGamesN pointed out that Two Point Studios tweeted back in November that it would unveil its new project on January 16 of this year—and Two Point Studios, as we reported in May 2017, has a publishing partnership with Sega. It all seems pretty straightforward from there.

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What makes the tease especially interesting is the studio itself, which was founded in 2016 by Mark Webley, a co—founder of Lionhead Studios, and Gary Carr, formerly the studio's creative director. The new outfit includes veterans of Lionhead and its predecessor, Bullfrog Productions, and while the nature of the nature of the project isn't known (January 16, remember), Two Point's Twitter page says it's "making sim games," and cites both Theme Park and Theme Hospital.

A more on-the-nose hint of what's in store comes by way of Resetera, which dug up a USPTO trademark filing for Two Point Hospital. We won't know for sure until early next week, but a Theme Hospital successor of some sort seems very likely.   

Andy Chalk

Andy has been gaming on PCs from the very beginning, starting as a youngster with text adventures and primitive action games on a cassette-based TRS80. From there he graduated to the glory days of Sierra Online adventures and Microprose sims, ran a local BBS, learned how to build PCs, and developed a longstanding love of RPGs, immersive sims, and shooters. He began writing videogame news in 2007 for The Escapist and somehow managed to avoid getting fired until 2014, when he joined the storied ranks of PC Gamer. He covers all aspects of the industry, from new game announcements and patch notes to legal disputes, Twitch beefs, esports, and Henry Cavill. Lots of Henry Cavill.