Ex-Far Cry lead is heading up development on a StarCraft first-person shooter at Blizzard

It's one of the studio's most beloved franchises. It birthed esports as we know it today and has been missing for many years - at least in terms of new games. According to Bloomberg reporter Jason Schreier, Blizzard is working on a new first-person shooter in the StarCraft franchise.

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With development led by ex-Ubisoft and Far Cry veteran Dan Hay, it's said to be in the early stages of development - with no word on whether or not it's a single-player, co-op, or competitive game.

Interestingly, this new project marks Blizzard's third attempt to create a StarCraft spin-off with an action or shooter focus. In the early 2000s, the studio canceled the stealth-action game StarCraft: Ghost, which was far along in development.

A lesser-known game, and one that wasn't formally announced, was Project Ares. Apparently, the studio canceled this StarCraft shooter because it wanted to focus on Overwatch. It would have been a Battlefield-style shooter with large maps, vehicles, and many players. As of writing, it's unclear what direction this new project is taking.

"They are working on a StarCraft shooter, StarCraft is not dead at Blizzard," Schreier said during a recent appearance on the IGN Unlocked podcast to promote his new book Play Nice: The Rise, Fall, and Future of Blizzard Entertainment. Schreier added that when he heard about it, the game was in the "incubation" stage of development.

It might get canceled like the previous StarCraft shooter attempts. "This felt like such an interesting and useful nugget to include because it really just shows you that Blizzard cannot quit StarCraft shooters," Schreier said. With Blizzard now a part of Microsoft, perhaps the third time's the charm. And maybe, with the arrival of StarCraft Remastered and StarCraft II to PC Game Pass, this new shooter is shaping up nicely.

With the recent success of Warhammer 40,000: Space Marine 2, a third-person co-op shooter set in the StarCraft universe would be cool.