11 Hugely-Anticipated Video Games You Won't Believe Got Cancelled

WhatCulture

Why does Star Wars 1313 not exist???

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00:00How many times have you been looking forward to a game only to follow up and find out that it's

00:04been cancelled? From trailers and screenshots to developer interviews and chance tweets teasing

00:08potential features, anything can hook us in and make us invested in a potential project's direction.

00:13Sadly though, because the gaming industry is one of the most fast-moving and ruthlessly cutthroat

00:17of them all when it comes to the highs and lows of balancing the books, any number of projects

00:21can go from dead certs to just dead. I'm Scott from WhatCulture.com and these are 11 hugely

00:26anticipated video games you won't believe got cancelled. Number 11, Scalebound.

00:31Let's start with one of the most recent games I still just, well just look at it. I hazard

00:36to say Scalebound was one of the reasons many people had confidence in the Xbox One as a

00:40console overall. Gameplay was said to be Platinum's first take on an open world formula, doling

00:44out loot grinds and consistent weapon upgrades at a steady clip. Before that approach was

00:48overdone and is now stale as hell. The quintessential X-Factor ingredient is that oh so sweet Platinum

00:53games combat, which if you've played anything from Bayonetta to Vanquish, Transformers Devastation

00:57to Nier Automata, is simply the finest third person hack and slashery in the business.

01:01Sadly, despite copious amounts of gameplay and tons of screenshots, Scalebound was canned

01:06in 2017, though the reasons are kind of insane, especially in retrospect as the Xbox One could

01:11really do with more exclusives. Microsoft's Phil Spencer, who personally I champion as the

01:16dude who salvaged the Xbox One almost single-handedly, said hype was so out of control for Scalebound,

01:21the final product could have only been a disaster. I mean, I guess, but look to Platinum's

01:25own comments from June 2018. They detail how going forward they only want to work on games

01:30where they control all aspects of potential sequels and funding. Perhaps this is the reason.

01:34Regardless, we're never gonna get How to Devil May Cry Your Dragon, and that just sucks.

01:39Number 10, Shadow Realms. Call me a sucker for vampiric underbellies of city structures

01:43or demonic force-type gubbins, but I thought Shadow Realms looked brilliant. Developed by Bioware

01:48as their first post-Mass Effect 3 game, Shadow Realms was set to be an online co-op brawler

01:52released episodically, throwing you and some friends into different scenarios each week or

01:56month as magical powers and acrobatics ruled the day. Despite getting pretty far in development,

02:00it was supposed to drop in 2015, only a year after we got eyes on, and a closed beta was about

02:05to go live, it was decided the response overall just wasn't positive enough, and all associated

02:10Bioware staff were redistributed across the company. I'm not saying this would have course

02:13corrected Bioware's trajectory overall, but I am saying that I would much rather play

02:17Shadow Realms than Mass Effect Andromeda.

02:19Number 9, Aliens Crucible. In one of the biggest blunders this side of Sonic making out with

02:24the princess, Sega once had a very unique RPG in their arsenal only to cancel it and release

02:29the remarkably buggy glitch-fest that was Aliens Colonial Marines instead. Crucible was

02:33set to be developed by RPG Masters Obsidian, creators of the goddamages make another one already

02:39the alpha protocol, and from the footage available appeared to be very much in the same vein as

02:43Mass Effect when it came to combat and character progression. It would have put us in the shoes

02:47of a variety of crew members desperately trying to survive against a number of xenomorphs.

02:51The nearest comparison that I can think of is the movie adaptation The Thing from 2002.

02:56Like in that game you'd form solid bonds with teammates, building trust through hours of

02:59dialogue only to see them ripped apart when you least expect it. Considering the hatred thousands

03:04of fans now have towards Colonial Marines, it's kinda baffling that Crucible not only got

03:09the shaft but continues to be unreleased despite its solid once-in-progress state.

03:13Number 8 Star Wars 1313

03:15It comes to something when footage from E3 2012 still holds up perfectly today. Star Wars

03:201313 boasted fantastic environments, visual flourishes, detailed character models and a

03:25high production value throughout. Telling the story of young Boba Fett on Coruscant, combat

03:29applied the Gears of War stop and pop cover system to great effect, having laser fire whizz

03:33over our heads as you returned with some blasts of your own. Anyone who played Star Wars Bounty

03:38Hunter will remember just how much fun third person shooting within the Star Wars universe

03:41can be, and combining Gears' combat with innovative moves like dragging enemies over

03:45cover made 1313 move at a movie-like pace. Sadly, it was terminated when LucasArts shut down,

03:51and though Visceral created something of a spiritual successor with their own Star Wars shooter,

03:55codenamed Ragtag, EA cleaved that in half too when Visceral was shut down in October 2017.

04:00Hey, EA? Third person shooters are still really cool. Please let someone make one.

04:06Number 7 Legacy of Cain Dead Son

04:09Legacy of Cain Dead Son was going to put you in the shoes of two alternating characters,

04:13Gain and Asher. The former being a Saradan vampire with a host of otherworldly abilities,

04:17and the latter a human whose soul accidentally becomes intertwined with Gain's, mixing their

04:22worlds and giving us a pretty sweet premise. Sadly, that's all we got to know before the project

04:26was scrapped, however the extremely brief footage available lends way to the idea that it was going

04:30to be a continuation of the more action-focused entries in the series. If there's any chance in

04:34hell the creative team behind this could ever assemble for another proper installment rather

04:38than the laughably, what, first-person shooter Nosgoth, that'd be just dandy.

04:43Number 6 Agent

04:44Rockstar are one of the most malleable developers in gaming, but a genre they're yet to fully dip their

04:49toes into is stealth. Yes, Manhunt was great, but the sound of Agent was even better. The thing with

04:55Agent was that we only got a batch of screens back after the reveal in 2007, but it was

04:59enough to get everyone well and truly invested. Even the official press release was elusive

05:03in all the right ways, saying that Agent would take us on a paranoid journey into the world

05:07of counterintelligence, espionage and political assassinations during the height of the Cold

05:11War at the end of the 1970s. It's great stuff and would have easily been one of the biggest

05:16tonal change-ups since the GTA in a high school style delights of Bully. Though the Agent

05:20trademark was renewed multiple times and various insiders have leaked more concept sketches

05:25across the last decade, Rockstar abandoned the Agent trademark altogether in November

05:292018. Either that means it's got a different name after a decade of nothing, or this particular

05:33agent has retired before their first mission.

05:36Number 5 Fez 2

05:38Phil Fish poured his heart and soul into Fez, which became many people's game of the year

05:42for 2012. Fish's divisive, outspoken personality though, that wasn't received quite so well.

05:47On an episode of Game Trailer's Invisible Walls, critic Marcus Beer called Fish a tosspot

05:52and a f***ing asshole for complaining about being asked questions by the press about the

05:56state of indie game development, despite being one of the movement's leading figures.

05:59After quite a lot of feedback to his various outbursts alongside this, Fish tweeted,

06:03I'm done, Fez 2 is cancelled, goodbye, as an overall response to how he felt he'd been

06:08treated by gamers and the press since release. Phil Fish was later victim to a hacking which

06:12revealed a huge amount of personal information, leading to his company Polytron being put up for

06:17sale, as he stated, no reasonable offer will be turned down, I am done, I want out.

06:23Needless to say, there will never be a Fez 2.

06:25Number 4, 8 Days

06:27In 2005, Sony dropped a trailer for what became one of that year's most anticipated titles,

06:328 Days, the gameplay footage of which appeared a year after, only months before Gears of War

06:36would define the experience this seemed to be going for. It's easy to look back on the

06:39gameplay footage and batch of leaked screens from 2009 as being just under the shooter, but

06:44back in 2006, this dropped jaws. Looking like we were finally going to be able to engage

06:48in some more John Woo slash Matrix style gunfights, where debris and the environment deform realistically

06:53as we dart between cover, it could have been tremendous if only Sony had seen it through.

06:58Apparently starring Ving Rhames, Gary Oldman and Dennis Hopper, and being spread across

07:028 separate states that would tell a story across the titular 8 Days, in the end the project

07:06fell into limbo thanks to Sony stating that they were moving into online games. Despite

07:11solid promotion and star power, 8 Days just didn't work for the Playstation's line-up

07:15as they saw it, but I can't help but think that it would be a perfect fit today.

07:19Number 3, Daredevil, The Man Without Fear

07:21One of the slickest and just downright coolest superheroes there'll ever be, Daredevil,

07:26RIP his Netflix incarnation, was set to make his major video game debut following in the

07:31footsteps of the spectacular Spider-Man game on PS1. However, even though developer Encore

07:35had almost everything in place, it was never to be, falling apart at the last second alongside

07:40the 2003 movie. Let's be honest though, it's totally baffling as to why this didn't come out.

07:44Even the trailer still looks incredibly enticing and that's a decade and a half after the initial

07:48release window. Give this a lick of polish and a new graphics engine, and fans of superheroes

07:53in general would lap it up. Taking a couple of pages out of Spidey's PS1 book, combat looked

07:57to be fairly similar, and with swinging mechanics that mimic the wall crawler's sense of in-game motion

08:02almost identically, who wouldn't love to dive into a similar experience, but with Daredevil

08:06in the titular role. Definitely another for the oh god just please make it anyway pile,

08:11just give us a Daredevil game. Number 2, The Getaway 3

08:14The first getaway game remains one of those times we all saw some gameplay footage or a batch of

08:19screenshots and suitably lost our minds at just how incredibly realistic and mind-blowing this

08:23game's version of Digital London looked. Little did we know just how far graphics would go in the

08:27future, but when the first getaway dropped in all its cockney gangster and snatch-style swagger,

08:32it was the nearest thing we had to an English version of Grand Theft Auto. Sony actually said

08:36back in 2008 that the series wasn't cancelled either, but they would be entering into what

08:39turned into a lengthy hiatus, culminating in the getaway London heist on PSVR, though that too has

08:44since ditched the getaway part of its name. Regardless, I'm holding out hope that at some

08:48point in the future the PS4 eventually sees another getaway in some form. This generation's

08:53technology does the big smoke the utmost justice. Number 1, Gotham by Gaslight. Just look at that

08:59ridiculously cobbled together costume. No silver screen bat has anything on how brilliantly stocky

09:04this version of Batman was set to be, and although it would see some semblance of life inside Arkham

09:08Origins as an unlockable costume, the full game of Gotham by Gaslight that was based off the

09:12fantastically dark, one-shot novel of the same name never saw the light of day. Developed by Day One

09:18Studios, those of horror FPS fear fame, you can see just how well their atmospheric tendencies were

09:22transferring across to a character like Batman who revels in the shadows. With a perfectly animated cape and

09:28many steampunk looking street corners, Gotham by Gaslight would have provided a great atmosphere

09:32for a Batman game. Information is scarce aside from a small amount of gameplay footage, alongside the

09:37knowledge that the project was canned in relation to THQ's closure, when they couldn't seem to secure

09:41the rights to keep going. Now I don't know about you, but the very idea of a super weighty Batman

09:45whose costume is whirring away as he battles a steampunk Joker in the midst of Victorian England is a

09:50mighty cool idea, and one that at least the comic delivered on. Why this wasn't picked back up

09:54following the huge success of Batman Arkham is beyond me, but here's hoping that it's remedied

09:59some point in the future.

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