Fort Lauderdale, Florida - 3000AD, Inc announced today that it had licensed the Serious Engine from Croteam the development team behind the upcoming Serious Sam game, for a yet to be announced PC/Xbox title.

"After nearly a decade of developing the highly complex and niche Battlecruiser series, it seemed like the time to listen to some good advice and make a brand new start in a different direction." said Derek Smart, President of 3000AD and lead developer of the Battlecruiser series. "I had been looking around for quite sometime, for a cost effective and at the same time, advanced third-party engine, to replace the previous one used in the Battlecruiser Tactical Engagement project. The Serious Engine, developed by a team of highly skilled developers, proved to be just that. If you have played the recently released demo of their first game to use this engine, Serious Sam, then you already have an idea of what I'm talking about."

This product, working title, Project ABC (After BattleCruiser), will primarily be targeted at the upcoming Microsoft XBox console, though there will be a PC version. Said Derek Smart "Moving to the console seems to be the wave of the future and we want to be there with a cutting edge game. This move should not be regarded as my endorsement of the ludicrous notion going around the industry, that gaming on the PC is dead or dying. That is just another rumour started by some paranoid PC gamers and some of our friends in gaming industry press corps. To me, the Xbox platform is just another high-end PC, albeit one that has the controlled and secure environment of a console. This, believe me, is a good thing. As such, there will be a PC version of Project ABC."

With the announcement of this exciting new project, the Battlecruiser Tactical Engagement add-on module for the upcoming Battlecruiser Millennium product, is now effectively terminated, due to technical difficulties with the third-party first person engine, previously licensed for it. As Derek Smart indicated "There comes a time when you, as a developer, producer, or publisher, are going to take one look at a project and make the decision to either carry on or terminate it. I chose to terminate it because it was just becoming an expensive, frustrating and time consuming venture for us. It didn't help either that the developers of the engine, went out of business not too long ago. In saying that however, I will probably release the work-in-progress BCTE product to the public, for free, as I did with Battlecruiser 3000AD v1.0 back in early '98."

With the termination of the BCTE project, comes the announcement that the release of Battlecruiser Millennium and Galactic Command Online, (the online only subscription based massively multiplayer version), will most likely mark the retirement of the Battlecruiser series as Derek takes a break to venture into new territory. Delivering the bad news to his team of developers and testers, Derek said "Am I going to be creating dumbed down games? No. Far from it. The move forward from Battlecruiser signals the creation of a new franchise which, while remaining on the high end and cutting edge of technology, will cater to a wider audience and provide the opportunity to branch out into different territory. GCO, will continue to grow for a very long time, as we add new features, online worlds and content to it. I may return to do another title in the series, perhaps, Battlecruiser 3020AD, but that will depend on how I want to grow my company. Right now, I want to develop a game that my daughter and children everywhere, would like to play without a 200 page manual, or the skills of a virtual psychotic killer. With that, you already know that Project ABC definitely won't be anything associated with Battlecruiser or its world and characters. I'm going back to the basics. Back to ABC."

3000AD Inc, is the developer of Battlecruiser, an interactive entertainment space and planetary combat series, for hard core gamers. First published in 1996 by Take2 Interactive, Battlecruiser has been published and distributed worldwide by Interplay Productions, GTi (now Infogrames) and Jack Of All Games. Battlecruiser is widely regarded as the most complex and advanced series ever developed for its genre. More information about 3000AD and its products, can be found at 3000AD.COM