It’s been an eventful weekend for sci-fi video game enjoyers, and one of the biggest reveals was the gameplay trailer for Owlcat Games’ The Expanse: Osiris Reborn.

It’s looking like The Expanse will be a cover based third-person shooter, with several options for gadgets and skills to round out characters and make gameplay more dynamic than just, “hide behind a chest high wall and pop out to shoot”. We also see a very small blink-and-you’ll-miss-it preview of Osiris Reborn’s dialogue system; it appears to be stylized but in the end, still a variation of the classic CRPG dialogue options Owlcat likes to employ.

Though on the subject of what Owlcat usually employs, that’s probably the biggest challenge many people see in store for Osiris Reborn; Owlcat’s previous titles, Pathfinder: Kingmaker, Pathfinder: Wrath of the Righteous, Warhammer 40,000: Rogue Trader, and the upcoming Warhammer 40,000: Dark Heresy are all top-down CRPGs, looking to emulate the classic feel of RPGs made in the late 90s to early 2000s like Bioware’s Baldur’s Gate or Neverwinter Nights games, so this transition to a dynamic action packed third-person cover shooter is a change that seems drastic, but every studio needs to branch out eventually, and Owlcat looks to do the same thing Bioware did before them.

And that’s the true elephant in the room, Owlcat is taking a very similar approach to what Bioware did back in the day, going from more traditional RPGs to a sci-fi cover shooter (though Bioware did have an “in-between” period after their top down isometric RPGs in the form of Jade Empire and the Knights of the Old Republic games). People very clearly see this, and they draw the connection and the comparisons. Bioware’s fall from grace has left a giant Mass Effect shaped hole in the RPG space, and several games have tried and will continue to try and fill it, many people are placing high expectations on Osiris Reborn because of this.

Owlcat Games are beloved by their audience, and they’ll no doubt support The Expanse: Osiris Reborn, it’s whether or not Owlcat can connect to a larger audience and break through their next glass ceiling on their meteoric rise to the top that I wait with bated breath to see. All I know is, I’ll definitely be playing The Expanse: Osiris Reborn when it releases in Spring of next year, and if you’re excited for it too you can wishlist the game on Steam here and on EGS here and on GOG here.