Saudi Arabia devs launches Unearthed: Trail of Ibn Battuta

Press release:
Semaphore, the games and media subsidiary of leading e-learning and training developer Semanoor International today announces the development of its flagship project (Unearthed: Trail of Ibn Battuta) and debuts its Online Multiplayer component (Unearthed Online) on social media networks starting with Facebook.

Unearthed: Trail of Ibn Battuta is a third person action adventure video game set in modern day Middle East that is presented in a TV-Style episodic format and it will be available in both Arabic and English.  The game will mark the first time that a Saudi Arabian development house targets the Sony Playstation 3 platform along with nine other major platforms including: PC, Mac OSX, iPhone, iPad, iPod Touch and Android Devices.

Get ready for the spine-chiller of the year! When Arab fortune hunter Faris Jawad and his archeologist sister Dania receive a call to visit Morocco they embark on an exotic adventure throughout the Middle East on the trail of the famous Muslim explorer Ibn Battuta (1304-1369 A.D.). The trail won’t be clear however as Faris will have to overcome an unholy alliance of a militia army leader, a weapons dealer and a wealthy antiquities smuggler who are after the same goal.

“We are thrilled to be introducing Saudi Arabia’s first multiplatform video game to the world, we are determined to deliver a next-generation experience that will do justice to the amazing story of Ibn Battuta” Said Emad Fahad Aldoghaither, the president of Semanoor International.

The game is utilizing the Unity platform as its core technology solution and is going to be among the first Unity-based titles to be launched on the PlayStation 3 platform.

“We are story-tellers at heart and we feel that we have a lot of great stories that are based on actual Middle Eastern history in this region and we strive to tell them using the very best in modern technologies, a key component to enable that is the Unity Game Engine and the flexibility it offers to allows us to iterate quickly and be constantly productive” said Ahmad Jadallah, the Director of Development at Semaphore and the game’s Writer and Director.

“We are incredibly excited to see that commercial PlayStation 3 content is being created through the Unity platform from new sources that we don’t normally connect to high-end game development” said Steffen Toksvig, VP on Engineering of Unity Technologies.

* Key Features:

-Travel across the Middle East from the wild life of Moroccan Atlas mountains to the alleys of old Damascus through the port of Alexandria and the metropolitan city of Dubai.

-Unique mix of platforming, melee fighting, shooting and stealth gameplay.

-Presented in a TV style episodic format along with recaps of previous episodes and teaser cliff hangers of what lies ahead.

- Unearthed Online is an additional free-to-play browser based multiplayer component that is available now on Facebook (http://www.unearthedonline.com).

For more information and to receive exclusive updates about the Unearthed: Trail of Ibn Battuta video game, visit:http://www.unearthedgame.com

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