Impressed by those Beyond Good & Evil 2 screens yesterday? By all accounts what you see is pretty much what you’ll get, at least graphically-speaking. We were assured that what we were looking at was running in real-time too – and that’s frankly awesome news if it’s true. However the game’s CGI-style, filmic visuals just might say more about the gameplay than you imagine.

Ubi-prez, Yves Guillemot, has already gone on record saying: “We think the (first) game was probably a little too difficult for the general gamers at that time. We’re going to make it more accessible and make sure that it’s really done for the new generation that’s come into videogames.”

Well, everyone’s after a slice of the casual gaming market, so there’s nothing especially controversial or enlightening in that statement. However we were more intrigued that this next iteration in the BG&E franchise was not actually introduced as a sequel – the 2 we added ourselves for the sake of easy identification. And shortly afterwards the game’s creator, Michel Ancel, commented something along the lines of this being “the future of videogames”, or suchlike. What could it all mean, we wondered?

And then, much later, we found ourselves in conversation with a well-connected chap from a Euro TV network, who whispered to us that he had it on very good authority that BG&E2 wasn’t actually going to be a straightforward video game at all, but a real-time interactive movie. At which points our heads fell off.

So what does this mean, exactly? Assuming there’s some substance to the ‘rumour’, of course. Will BG&E2 turn out to be some kind of 21st century Dragon’s Lair where interaction is limited to timely button presses made at specific junctures? Or will it merely be a super-easy adventure designed to suit newbie gamers? Time alone will tell on that front. But while we wait for specifics let the rumour-mill grind into life...