British game development studio Ninja Theory has a promising year ahead of it as fans await the release of Senua's Saga: Hellblade 2, which created a lot of buzz when it was first announced for the newly revealed Xbox Series X at The Game Awards 2019. It seems it has been shoring up its staff to make the game as good as possible, given long-time Naughty Dog Environmental Artist Andrew Watkins recently updated his LinkedIn profile to reflect his two-month tenure as a Senior Environmental Artist at Ninja Theory.
While nothing in Watkins' profile indicates he is specifically working on Hellblade 2, the job experience states he has been at Ninja Theory since December 2019 — right around the time when the upcoming title was revealed and later confirmed to be a console exclusive for Microsoft.
Timing-wise, it also seems late for Watkins to be jumping on Ninja Theory's Bleeding Edge, a multiplayer brawler set to release this March. So it would make sense for him to be working on the sequel to Hellblade: Senua's Sacrifice, a fantasy action-adventure game inspired by Norse mythology which was a big hit for the studio and received multiple accolades at both The Game Awards 2017 and the 2018 BAFTA Awards.
Watkins' LinkedIn indicates he is still working at Naughty Dog as well. During his nine years there thus far, the company has released critically acclaimed titles like The Last of Us (which was recently voted best game of the decade in a MetaCritic user poll) and Uncharted 4: A Thief's End.
This new gig is not unprecedented, however. The Environmental Artist has previously worked with Ninja Theory according to his LinkedIn, specifically on the PlayStation 3's Heavenly Sword between 2006 and 2008 — well before the company became a first-party developer for Microsoft.
At this point there's no real telling what work Watkins is doing at Ninja Theory. While Senua's Saga: Hellblade 2 is the likeliest possibility, there could be other projects on the horizon to replace Bleeding Edge in their development cycle that the public is currently unaware of. No matter what, the acquisition sounds incredibly promising for the studio, so fans of their work should expect a lot to look forward to.
Source: Andrew Watkins/LinkedIn