Earlier this week, Take-Two's brand new label Private Division was named publisher of Obsidian's big and secret, in-development role-playing game.

Take-Two, the parent company of 2K and Rockstar, is a big name, and what big names have been doing recently - Activision Blizzard, EA and Warner - is pushing loot boxes in their games. The question naturally followed: will Private Division push Obsidian to do the same?

It prompted an official response from the studio as well as a very short video featuring the leaders of the new Obsidian game project, Leonard Boyarsky and Tim Cain.

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UPDATE 16TH NOVEMBER: Something really was afoot - the backer beta for Pillars of Eternity 2: Deadfire has launched!

It's not feature-complete and there are a "number of things" Obsidian is not quite ready to show yet but will be rolled out over time, said design director Josh Sawyer in an accompanying video. "There's at least one really big feature that's very complicated and we need to put some more time into before players take a look at it," he added, "but it's a very cool feature."

In the closed beta you'll poke around a Deadfire archipelago village called Tikawara, and the island surrounding it. You won't be playing with final-game companions because they're still in development, still being cast and their voice lines recorded, and Obsidian doesn't want to spoil any of their stories. Plus, Obsidian isn't doing the closed beta to get feedback on them so much as feedback on the core mechanics and interfaces in the game.

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