Gollop made the revelation on the comments wall beneath a Gamasutra interview with 2K creative director Jonathan Pelling - the man behind the FPS reboot of X-COM. He blames RTS games for "killing off" turn-based strategy in the mid-'90s, saying that most publishers now "run a mile" from the genre, but cites Nintendo as an unlikely saviour.
"I am now working on a turn-based tactical RPG which will be a 3DS launch title," says Gollop. "Thanks to Advance Wars, Fire Emblem and Final Fantasy Tactics it seems turn-based games are not totally dead - at least for Nintendo handhelds. I would argue that Pokemon has a lot of parallels with X-COM in its game system, despite being classified as an RPG.
"The core of Pokemon is a turn-based tactical battle enriched by a sophisticated higher level meta-game that allows players to experiment with many game elements and combinations of forces - and Pokemon is the second most successful game franchise in the world. If done right, would an X-COM game with a turn-based combat system be successful? Absolutely!"
As spotted by Nintendo DS blog, Tiny Cartridge, Gollop's LinkedIn profile states that he has spent the past three years at Ubisoft Bulgaria/Sofia, leading to speculation that the project will be published by the french company. The blog goes on to point out that Ubisoft announced Tom Clancy's Ghost Recon: Lead The Ghosts, a turn based strategy game for 3DS, a few months ago, inferring that it could be the game in question.
You can read our Making Of: X-COM: Enemy Unknown here.