Blizzard has rights to Redneck Rampage

The rights to one of the most easily forgotten FPS games of yore, Redneck Rampage, have been picked up by Blizzard, sparking rumours that a sequel to the hillbilly shooter may be the secretive fifth project that Blizzard is working on.

The original Redneck Rampage was released in 1997 on the PC and was on the last outings for the Build Engine, which was first made famous by Duke Nukem. Developed by Xatrix and Interplay, Rampage appeared dated and coarse but managed to continue over a couple of expansions and spin-off titles.

The license for the series was then picked up by Vivendi Universal in 2004 for around $300,000, before getting passed over to Blizzard Entertainment after the merger of Activision and Blizzard. It's also interesting to note that, according to IncGamers, there are several Blizzard developers who also worked on Redneck Rampage back in the day.

The likelihood that Blizzard is stepping away from its core titles to have a go with the little-known Redneck Rampage is relatively slim though, despite rumours. While Blizzard does own all the rights to the series, it's most likely the case that the rights were handed over by default during the merger and weren't actively pursued by the studio.

In fact, as Eurogamer points out, Blizzard hasn't worked on anyone else's IPs since Justice League Task Force for the SNES back in 1995.

Would you like a new Redneck Rampage game, or would you rather see some of the old Build Engine games ported to other platforms? Dark Forces on the iPhone, anyone? Let us know your thoughts in the forums.