Wargaming brings back Master of Orion

Wargaming who have been enjoying tremendous success with World of Tanks, and moderate success with World of Warplanes aren't just focused on free-to-play online war games. Master of Orion is a classic 4X (eXplore, eXpland, eXploit and eXterminate) space title, the original was developed by Simtex and published by MicroProse, while the most recent game Master of Orion III was developed by Quicksilver Games and published by Infogrames in 2013. Wargaming acquired the rights for Master of Orion in July 2003 from a bankrupt Atari.

The new game that simply goes under Master of Orion for now is being developed by Argentine developer NGD Studios with members of the original team contributing.

"Master of Orion is a game that brings Wargaming truly back to its roots, not only as a company but also in how it influenced my personal interest in both games and making them," said Victor Kislyi, CEO of Wargaming. "The series' iconic gameplay has stood the test of time and working with NGD Studios to bring the series back to life is a truly exciting moment for the team."

"As longtime fans of the Master of Orion, the opportunity to help breathe new life into this acclaimed game has been a dream come true," said Andrés Chilkowski, Co-founder and CEO of NGD Studios. "While we've made many improvements overall to the game, we're confident that its classic and addictive gameplay will appeal to gamers no matter if they played the game years ago or are now just experiencing it for the very first time."

No word on when we might see this reboot released, but we expect it to feature heavily at E3 next week. They promise improved visuals (no major surprise given it's been 12 years), revamped UI, tutorials, an orchestral score from the original composers, and voice-acting by well-known actors (we assume they'll be known for the roles in various sci-fi shows most likely).