It’s been awhile since we’ve heard anything about GRIN’s “unreleased masterpiece” — a collaboration with Square Enix (and assumed Final Fantasy off-shoot) titled Fortress. An anonymous report released last September claimed the title was currently in the hands of another, unnamed developer. Yesterday, some tech demo footage purportedly displaying the fruits of said studio’s labor landed on YouTube. We’ve posted said video after the jump.

Without any inclination of who is responsible for developing Fortress — if anyone is developing Fortress — it’s impossible for us to test the credibility of this video. The original poster, YouTube user DiipuSurotu, doesn’t mention where the video came from, only stating that it’s a tech demo for an “official, but currently unannounced sequel to Final Fantasy XII.” We’ve contacted Square Enix to see what they think of the footage.

It doesn’t really look like your traditional Squeenix fare, but the character models certainly resemble those featured in the leaked concept art that surfaced last year. Oh, also? There’s totally a Chocobo at the 1:15 mark. That’s Final Fantasy-y enough for us.

[Thanks to everyone who sent this in!]

Joakim Hellstedt classified these under “various pitches” and “various gameplay and misc,” so if it even had a working title, it wasn’t used here. But it depicts a combat system for a game specifically mentioning a ninja protagonist, whose abilities are augmented by “ninja energy.” So, dodging bullets and attacks at partial strength becomes a “shadow dodging explosion” with a maxed energy meter. A power attack against “weak/human opponent,” has him slicing the foe cleanly in two at the torso.

Further down, it uses helicopters and dinosaurs, if not meant to be in the game, to at least demonstrate other abilities. Damn, we missed ninjas and dinosaurs? This is like Coleridge losing his vision of Xanadu …

It’s interesting work, if not for the what-might-have-been, then for the glimpse it provides of how gameplay processes are spec’d out in the early stages of a game’s design.

Online Portfolio of Joakim Hellstedt [Site; scroll down about a quarter of the way; via Siliconera]

Professional resume snoop superannuation has uncovered some concept art and CV listings for a game code-named “Fortress”, which we’re all but certain is the Final Fantasy (looks FFXII_related) action game spinoff we’d been told by former employees GRIN Stockholm had been working on from the time principal development on Bionic Commando wound up to the time they were shut down.

Say what you will about GRIN’s track record of late, this would have been a blast to get a better look at.

[superannuation]

GRIN, which has development offices in Sweden, Spain and Indonesia, is rumored to be in the process of shuttering its Gothenburg and Barcelona-based annexes. Layoffs at its headquarters in Stockholm are rumored to amount to nearly 30. That reduction in staff and studios is said to affect somewhere between 100 and 160 employees total.

The developer most recently shipped Terminator: Salvation for multiple platforms to mixed reviews. It also shipped Wanted: Weapons of Fate and Bionic Commando Rearmed within the last year.

While layoffs that occur after a major title ships are not uncommon in the industry, the alleged closure of studios is more telling of GRIN’s situation.

We’ve contacted representatives from Capcom and GRIN, but have yet to receive confirmation on the layoffs. Consider this distressing news rumor until we hear something more definitive, but given the numerous sources, all of whom wished to be kept anonymous, we’d think something’s definitely up.