Hitman 3 game director will lead Crysis 4 development

Crysis 4 was announced in January with a tiny teaser trailer, but aside from the fact that it exists, and that "Crysis 4" is just a working title, nothing else was divulged. Since then we've heard nothing about the forthcoming first-person shooter—the series' first since 2012's Crysis 3—but rest assured it's alive. Today, the official Crysis Twitter account announced the project's game director.

And it's a name you might recognize: Mattias Engström was the game director of Hitman 3, but is now joining Crytek to lead development on Crysis 4. Engström has had a hand in all of IO Interactive's modern Hitman trilogy, serving as a level designer on the first two before taking the reins on the finale. He's also worked as a level designer at Ubisoft, most notably on Far Cry 3 and Assassin's Creed: Revelations. Before that, he worked on Ubisoft's dormant World in Conflict series.

Crytek used the announcement to point to its job openings: the German studio is recruiting for dozens of roles on the Crytek 4 project, ranging art director, game designer and level designer. Given the nature of the roles, it looks like Crysis 4 is a long way from release. 

The fourth Crysis instalment was all but confirmed way back in 2012, which feels like centuries ago. Back then, Crytek CEO Cevat Yerli insisted that the future of Crysis was free-to-play. "I believe F2P is our inevitable future," Yerli said at the time. "I believe there are F2P titles out there that can be story-telling and cooperative with your friends and competitive with your friends. It's all possible."

It's hugely unlikely that Crytek's vision for Crysis hasn't dramatically changed in the 10 years since, but one thing seems consistent: it isn't going to be called Crysis 4.