Author: John Scalzo

5th Cell, the developers of the ultracute Scribblenauts and its equally cute sequel Super Scribblenauts, will be branching out in 2011. The developer is hard at work on Hybrid, a “revolutionary” third-person shooter for the Xbox Live Arcade.

Before today, Hybrid’s storyline was a pretty closely guarded secret. But now we know just what the game’s about:

“Hybrid is set in the post-apocalyptic year 2031, after an extinction-level asteroid collided with Earth wiping out billons. A single-celled alien bacterium buried deep within the asteroid spread into the atmosphere, infecting half of the survivors and turning them into the Variant, a genetically altered race. Six years later the Variant began a new world order and waged a massive global war against the immune populace, known as the Paladin.”

Players will be able to take up arms as a Paladin or a Variant in a “persistent online world war.” As players win battles for their faction, territories and countries on the game’s world map will turn Paladin blue or Variant red.

Hybrid will also introduce a gameplay mechanic called “Combat Focused Movement.” 5th Cell didn’t explain what that means for shooter fans, but they did promise to reveal more during the 2011 Game Developers Conference, which runs from February 28th through March 4th.