Twitter sleuth Kurakasis believes they’ve figured out the name of Bethesda’s upcoming Indiana Jones video game. And, well, it’s right up there with howlers like “Kingdom of the Crystal Skull” and “Dial of Destiny.” According to a bunch of URLs recently registered by the rightsholder Lucasfilm, the name looks likely to be Indiana Jones and the Great Circle.
Perhaps the URL for “The Lovely Triangle” was already taken?
As yet, absolutely nothing is known about The Great Circle beyond this accidentally discovered detail—not even a genre is out there. We know from another leak that this game was originally meant to have been released in 2022, and from FTC court documents that it’s going to be an Xbox exclusive. But beyond that, crickets.
It’s been known that Swedish developer MachineGames has been working on an Indiana Jones license for at least three years. It’s the team behind the last decade’s trilogy of Wolfenstein first-person shooter hits, The New Order, The New Colossusand Youngblood. So an FPS seems likely. Owners Zenimax (the pharmaceutical-sounding name of Bethesda’s holding company) have kept usually quiet about what it might entail. Of course, that entire spider web of companies is now owned by Microsoft.
We’ll learn more with January 18’s Xbox Showcase, where the game is to be finally, properly revealed. Of course, Microsoft and Bethesda were presumably hoping to wait until then before anyone found out what it was called. Oh god, what if the entire plan had been a name reveal, and no actual footage?
Kurakasis’s poking around Lucasfilm’s paperwork has revealed not only addresses like “indianajonesandthegreatcirclegame.com” and “hindianajones-and-the-great-circle.com,” but also a two-year-old European trademark registered for “The Great Circle.” It’s very disappointing to learn this is for the game, and not George launching a new cult.
What the hell is it with Indiana Jones and just the worst titles? This is a series that used to have wonderful names like Raiders of the Lost Ark and The Temple of Doom! Now we’ve got The Decent Hexagon or whatever it is, because I’ve already forgotten. However, there remains good reason to hope this’ll be a fun game, given the talent of the team making it—we should hopefully know a lot more very soon.
