2K Boston/Australia head Ken Levine has been one of the more open people to talk to in the gaming press, always willing to chat with journalists about everything from his hit game BioShock to game design and writing to pretty much anything else. But lately even Levine has been strangely silent despite a lot of recent BioShock related news, including a sequel announcement and a BioShock movie. Why the clamp down?

Variety thinks it knows the answer. Citing unnamed sources, it claims Levine is in the middle of re-negotiating his current contract with 2K Boston/Australia's parent company Take Two Interactive. According to the story the talks have been ongoing for a couple of months now and may take some time to complete. It's unknown exactly what Levine wants from Take Two but BioShock was the publisher's major hit of last year and keeping Levine on board would go a long way to establishing itself as a company that until recently has only had the Grand Theft Auto franchise to fall back on.