Even Capcom was skeptical of Lost Planet 3's new developer

Spark Unlimited hasn't had the best track record, having worked on the poorly-reviewed FPS games, Turning Point and Legendary. It was odd that Capcom would assign such a shaky developer on the Lost Planet franchise. But lo and behold, Lost Planet 3 proved to be one of the surprise hits of E3. Capcom producer Andrew Szymanski discussed how this surprising alliance formed, and admitted that even Capcom was skeptical of giving the game to the team at first.

Speaking to Siliconera, Szymanski admitted that he wasn't entirely confident in Spark at first. "Honestly speaking, when I saw their name and looked up their track record, I thought, 'What am I getting myself into?'"

Spark proved themselves capable by showing off a prototype for an unreleased game from a team member new to the studio. And in spite of the studio's shaky history, the demo was impressive enough to land the job. "Software doesn't lie. You can make up a bunch of smoke and mirrors with art and video, but when you actually have a piece of software running on a 360, that you play, you can't lie with that. It either plays well and looks good, or it doesn't."

It's unclear if that prototype has evolved into the game Capcom is now marketing as Lost Planet 3. The radical new mechanics and surprisingly rooted presentation proved to be a refreshing change from the last two games in the series. Szymanski is hopeful that LP3 can prove to be Spark's big break. "There's something to be said for a developer who has the skill, but—for any number of reasons—hasn't had the ability to show that."