Right before Bioshock, Irrational was making a game called The Lost. It never came out, but just today they showed the trailer for the game, and gave a little backstory about what happened to it:

In 2005, things changed for The Lost when Irrational’s Creative Director Ken Levine met the CEO of a development studio in India called FXLabs. This fellow was hoping to bring more of the gaming industry to the Indian market. The pitch was to take the final finished version of The Lost, port it to PC only, and repurpose the game for the Indian market. The idea was approved, and localization of this port was under way.

“They spent about a year or so after we gave them all game assets and they periodically checked in,” says Gardner. “Finally, someone sent around a link to this YouTube video of the trailer for the game, and it had a bunch of Bollywood actors in it. There was this really well known Bollywood actress in the lead role, and just to see their spin on the game was a bit of cross-culture shock.”

I-... I...

obligatory what is this...? I dont even...

I thought of a multitude of replies, yet all I typed was this.

I'd buy it.

@GloriousDinosaur said:

obligatory what is this...? I dont even...

What's so weird about it, Haven't you see anything from India before?

I always wanted to see footage of this game.

What I didn't know is that I always wanted to see footage of this game with a pretty Indian lady dancing in front of it.

It's... probably for the best that this didn't come out.

I have no idea what to say. Bollywood isn't so weird (alright it is a bit weird...), but mixing it with video games is just... VERY weird.

Bollyshock :o

So a trailer that was posted in July 2010 is considered "just shown today"?

Guys, the dancing lady was 100% Irrational's creation. What you see behind her was the doing of FXlabs.

Guys, the dancing lady was 100% Irrational's creation. What you see behind her was the doing of FXlabs.

Wow, this is a great industry story. Thanks for posting.

@SeriouslyNow said:

@thehexeditor said:

Guys, the dancing lady was 100% Irrational's creation. What you see behind her was the doing of FXlabs.

Nope. The dancing lady is a Bollywood actress whose name escapes me. The game was re purposed and released in India under the name Agni: Queen of Darkness in 2008. It's already been reviewed and did quite well considering

I was joking...