Eidos Montreal, the developer behind the upcoming mysterious project, Deus Ex Universe, today spoke out to make it clear that the upcoming game is not an MMO. In a blog post announcing a brand-new game engine, the Dawn Engine, community manager Sacha Ramtohul addressed this topic.

“As you can imagine, the Dawn Engine will form the cornerstone for all Deus Ex Universe projects at Eidos-Montréal,” Ramtohul said. “Some of you have had concerns that ‘Universe’ meant ‘MMO’. Rest assured, it does not.”

So what exactly is Deus Ex Universe? Eidos isn’t yet ready to share specifics, though Ramtohul says it’s “the name we are giving to the fictional world and the rich lore we are creating for it.” The “Universe” isn’t just one game, as it will comprise core games and “any other projects that will help bring the world of Deus Ex to life,” Ramtohul said.

Games within the Deus Ex Universe, announced in October 2013, will work together in some way, but again, Eidos is keeping things under wraps for now.

“We won’t go into too much detail for now, but what we envision is for our projects to have meaningful ties to one another, in order for them to strengthen and deepen your experience within this Universe,” Ramtohul said.

As for the Dawn Engine, it’s a brand-new piece of technology that Eidos says has been designed exclusively for PC and new-generation consoles. The screenshot above was taken inside the engine.

“In the past, we’ve relied on existing engines for our games. But in the end, we found that our creative vision was somehow limited,” Ramtohul said. “So we decided it was time for us to invest in creating an engine tailored for our needs.”

Dawn Engine is based on a “heavily modified” version of IO Interactive’s Glacier 2 engine, and is meant to be flexible and powerful enough to accommodate the types of games Eidos wants to make.

Finally, Ramtohul says you shouldn’t go crazy poring over the Dawn Engine screenshot for clues about Eidos’ next game, as the image is meant only to represent the “level of detail and artistic fidelity” that’s possible using the new tech.

The most recent core Deus Ex game was 2011’s Deus Ex: Human Revolution.

Got a news tip or want to contact us directly? Email news@gamespot.com