The makers of Splitgate are building Empulse, a spiritual successor to Titanfall

The studio behind Splitgate is quietly building a new shooter called Empulse — a game that looks a lot like the Titanfall sequel EA has never made. Pre-alpha footage obtained exclusively by Insider Gaming (Tom Henderson) shows wall-running, grappling hooks, boost pads, and giant mechs, filling a gap in the market that has sat empty since Titanfall 2 launched in 2016. EA confirmed it canceled an unannounced Titanfall project in April 2025, leaving the franchise dormant with no official path forward.

The game

Empulse plays in two layers. On foot, players chain together wall-runs, grappling hooks, and speed boosters — mechanics that draw from both Titanfall and Call of Duty: Black Ops 3. The second layer kicks in when a player reaches one of several mechs scattered around the map. Those mechs carry Gatling guns, energy shields, and missile launchers, and controlling one gives a clear combat advantage. Visually the game ditches Splitgate's bright color palette for a darker aesthetic closer to Ubisoft's now-shuttered XDefiant.

The alpha footage shows a Team Deathmatch mode. Henderson says details beyond what was shown remain scarce, but he believes the concept has real potential. No platforms, pricing model, or release date have been confirmed. An official announcement is expected sometime in 2026.

The risk

1047 Games arrives at this project with credibility damage it needs to repair. Splitgate 2 launched on June 6, 2025, and collapsed almost immediately — server failures, a monetization bundle priced above $80, and player numbers that dropped over 90 percent on Steam. By July 22 the studio had reverted the game to beta status, laid off staff twice, and shut down the original Splitgate servers. CEO Ian Proulx wore a "Make FPS Great Again" hat at Summer Game Fest during the crisis, generating further backlash.

The mech-shooter appetite is clearly there. Rival title Mecha Break pulled 256,000 concurrent players during its February 2026 Steam beta, per GamesRadar, though it faced similar criticism over monetization and servers. Empulse is still pre-alpha, and 1047 Games has described this as a last chance to prove the studio can deliver. Whether it lands or not depends entirely on execution — and on lessons actually learned from Splitgate 2.