Square Enix has reportedly cancelled a major sequel that fans have been waiting several years to see. We live in a pretty brutal time for the games industry right now. On top of countless lay offs at major studios, games get scrapped both publicly and behind the scenes. Sometimes these are games we weren’t even meant to know about. It’s not exactly uncommon for a game to get scrapped early on in development either, sometimes things clearly aren’t working and the studio decides to go in a whole new direction. Unfortunately, it’s a vicious cycle as cancellations also lead to layoffs.
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With all of that said, developer People Can Fly was reportedly working on a sequel to its RPG shooter Outriders. The game was released back in 2021 to fairly middling reviews, but at the time, it was one of the biggest third-party releases to do a day and date release with Xbox Game Pass. This obviously juiced its player numbers and attracted a lot of attention to the game from people who may not have otherwise invested $60 into it. Although Outriders wasn’t some commercial juggernaut as it failed to turn a profit in its first year, it proved successful enough to keep investing in it as Square Enix claimed it was the publisher’s “next big franchise” not long after launch.
Outriders 2 Cancelled
Tragically, Outriders 2 was reportedly cancelled last month at People Can Fly. According to a report from TheThumbWars, the game was nearly finished when the plug was pulled and was operating under the name of Project Gemini. Reasons for the cancellation were kept vague, but it was noted that it was for reasons outside of the studio’s control, likely indicating the call came down from IP owner Square Enix.
Insider Gaming corroborated the game’s cancellation, but noted that it saw footage and images of the game that suggested it wasn’t as close to being finished as reported. The site went on to note that the project was doing motion capture, which is where actors have their movements physically captured on a soundstage. Essentially, it’s where all of the acting for cutscenes and animations are done.
Mocap can happen at various stages of production, so it’s not totally clear how far along they were in that process. Given the first game was released back in April 2021, it stands to reason that Outriders 2 was still far along in its development as it would’ve had several years to cook. Still, it sounds like Outriders 2 is dead and fans shouldn’t expect to see the series continue anytime soon. It’s a brutal cancellation as People Can Fly likely would’ve had a really refined sequel that could’ve been great.
People Can Fly is working on a variety of other projects, including assisting in the development of Gears of War: E-Day. People Can Fly worked on Gears of War: Judgement for the Xbox 360, so the developer is pretty familiar with the franchise and has roots in the third-person shooter genre. Whether or not Outriders ever makes a comeback remains to be seen, but given it was just one game, it’s hard to imagine it making some big resurgence in a decade or having any sort of relevance.
Did you have any interest in Outriders 2? Let me know in the comments.
