Announcing a cool game from a well-known developer is always a holiday for any gamer. True, sometimes it happens that they greatly overestimate their strength – and then we either get a trimmed version of the original promises, or we get nothing at all. Unfortunately, the latter is often the case. We’ve put together a list of the potentially coolest games that never saw the light of day for stupid reasons.
Star burger
- Announce date: October 10, 2012
- Developer and Publisher: Cloud Imperium Games
- Genre: space simulator, first person shooter
- Originally promised release date: 2016
Since the announcement Star Citizen has passed more than ten years, and the amount spent on it exceeds $ 500 million (about 37 billion rubles). The space simulator was presented not only as an MMO with fantastic combat, a complex economic system and complete freedom of action, but also promised a rich single-player campaign. However, little is known about this at the moment.
To date, there is no estimated release date or plot details. Simply put, the players do not know at all what awaits them and pay for a “pig in a poke”. By the way, the project is spent with this money, and not with the help of the publisher.
More photos are in the gallery.
The reason why this happened is quite simple: the Cloud Imperium Games studio overestimated its capabilities and admitted after the announcement that progress in video game creation had not yet reached the level to realize everything that was planned. But still, the company assures that the game is in the active development phase and will see the light sooner or later.
Fable legends
- Announce date: August 20, 2013
- Developer: Lionhead Studios
- Publisher: Xbox Game Studios
- Genre: Action RPG, Adventure
- Originally promised release date: October 2015
Series fans Fable was overjoyed when a new part of their favorite game was announced in 2013. Sadly, the joy didn’t last long as Lionhead Studios, which was under the wing of Microsoft at the time, announced its closure.
Why did this happen? There aren’t many details, but apparently Microsoft didn’t think the game was ambitious enough. Unfortunately, dissatisfied fans of the series could not influence the decision.
The funny thing is that after some time the work on the series was handed over to Playground Games, which announced the imminent return of Fable. But the developer company is also in no hurry to release details, blaming the engine or its inexperience or something else for the slow development.
star wars 1313
- Announce date: May 31, 2012
- Developer and Publisher: LucasArts Entertainment
- Genre: action-adventure, shooter
- Originally promised release date: unknown
Everything here is rather prosaic. In 2012, LucasArts was working hard on a game (which would be the main character, Boba Fett, by the way), and in 2013 a deal was made between LucasFilm and Disney.
Unfortunately, Disney not only closed the project, but also disbanded the LucasArts team, as they wanted to divert resources to more interesting projects for them. Given the company’s current reputation with amateurs Star Wars, this decision is reckless.
In 2022, a gameplay video of the canceled game was published, which caused even more regret: the world apparently lost a real hit.
Divinity: fallen heroes
- Announce date: March 27, 2019
- Developer: Larian Studios, Logic Artists
- Publisher: Larian Studios
- Genre: TRPG
- Originally promised release date: November 2019
Divinity: Original Sin 2 has made a lot of noise since its release. Moreover, according to all gaming publications, she was even predicted the title of “Game of the Year”, if in 2017 Larian Studios were not prevented by new The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild. Somehow the developers decided not to despair, and therefore soon announced Divinity: Fallen Heroes, which was supposed to continue the story of the main characters. Work began in collaboration with Logic Artists.
And after a while it turned out that way: both companies announced their excessive workload, over-developing and other things they could come up with, and froze the project, each focused on their own business. As a result, nothing has been heard of Divinity: Fallen Heroes since 2019. That’s too bad.
The older scrolls 6
- Announce date: June 11, 2018
- Developer: Bethesda Game Studios
- Publisher: Bethesda Softworks
- Genre: Action RPG
- Originally promised release date: unknown
There are legends about this game. Some have already lost all hope of seeing it, while others eagerly await a new trailer every E3. However, since 2018 there is no more news.
It is possible that after the release Starfield will have some more news, but as practice shows, it is better not to trust Bethesda in such matters. Well, there is nothing to despair! At least we can be sure that we will see it sooner or later Skyrim 2.
Where do you think The Elder Scrolls 6 will take place?
Project LMNO
- Announcement date: 2010
- Developer and Publisher: Electronic Arts
- Genre: action-adventure, shooter
- Originally promised release date: unknown
This game has become famous because it was developed in collaboration with Steven Spielberg (Steven Spielberg). Unfortunately, this didn’t save Electronic Arts Los Angeles from collapse. The fact is that the game was very similar in terms of gameplay Mirror’s Edge. And when everything was fine there, the developers of Project LMNO began to fall out of their hands. I wanted incredible variability of actions, and parkour, and shootouts, and a twisted plot – everything in general. As a result, the publisher gave its vote to Mirror’s Edge, and Project LMNO has been shut down.
The funny thing is that Electronic Arts itself remarked, they say, that they don’t want to release new games now (it was 2010). Probably then they decided to focus on the development of the next catalog for The Sims 3.
Ares
- Announce date: never announced
- Developer and Publisher: Blizzard Entertainment
- Genre: First person shooter
- Originally promised release date: unknown
Blizzard has many times started developing a shooter based on Starcraft – and knocked out the same number of times. The game, codenamed Ares, was created on the engine Overwatch – they say it’s faster. There were even ready-made gameplay prototypes in 2017, although development, let’s say, was not very smooth.
As a result, Blizzard again decided to close the project for unknown reasons – the company declined to comment. But it’s worth noting that they announced pretty soon after that Overwatch 2, so it’s not hard to guess.
Silent hills
- Announce date: August 12, 2014
- Developer: Kojima Productions
- Publisher: Konami
- Genre: Survival Horror
- Originally promised release date: 2016
Demo version of the forthcoming Silent Hills is known as a gamble of Hideo Kojima and Guillermo del Toro. The demo was received very quickly by the fans, but the game was canceled anyway, so much so PT has even been removed from the PlayStation games catalog.
The reason for everything was the conflict between Konami and Hideo Kojima. There are many versions, one of which claims that Kojima-san did not want to use the Fox Engine, and this became the basis for the game’s cancellation.
It’s hard to say what actually happened there, but the Genius was indeed soon fired from Konami and focused on producing his own games. Guillermo del Toro limited himself to unflattering remarks towards the Japanese publisher.
Beyond good and evil 2
- Announce date: May 28, 2008
- Developer: Ubisoft Montpellier, Ubisoft
- Publisher: Ubisoft
- Genre: Action Adventure, Shooting, Fighting
- Originally promised release date: unknown
Beyond Good and Evil 2 was announced way back in 2008, but has not yet been released. However, it has not been canceled. Ubisoft stopped development or denied it, and swore closed alpha testing was happening even within the company.
Insider Tom Henderson (Tom Henderson) commented on this: “it is unlikely that the game will be released in the next two years, the development team does not have any creative concept and direction.” Well, at least the fans of the first part still have hope to see it one day.
Half-Life 2: Episode Three
- Announce date: May 22, 2006
- Developer and Publisher: Valve
- Genre: action-adventure, shooter
- Originally promised release date: late 2007
Series Half-Life can be called long-suffering. Memes that exist about Half-Life 3 is beyond count, although some fans even go after it Half-Life: Alyx continues to believe in the best.
Nevertheless, if no one even announced the third part, then Half-Life 2: Episode Three was a rather specific announcement in 2006. Nothing good, as you might guess, it didn’t end: the game was canceled. There were many reasons and comments: reluctance to do it ‘just like that’ and ‘for a quarterly report’, dissatisfaction with developments and the company’s decision to go the other way. Gabe Newell even clarified which side it is, citing it as an example Team Fortress 2.
While this top not only includes canceled projects but projects that have been continually postponed over the years, we can say with confidence that none of them would be bad. On the other hand, perhaps the rejection of this or that game gave rise to another development, which later became a hit. And which game from our selection were you most looking forward to? Or maybe you’re still waiting.
Which game from the collection was or was waiting the most?
Source: VG Times
Christina Moncayo is a contributing writer for “Social Bites”. Her focus is on the gaming industry and she provides in-depth coverage of the latest news and trends in the world of gaming.