The Last Guardian Catch-All

So I heard today that The Last Guardian was cancelled. Apparently Gamestop removed it from their release lists, and have been calling pre-orders to inform of the cancellation. Sony said they're looking into it [Joystiq]

This would suck if true-- I hope this whole thing is a result of Gamestop's stupidity leaking into other aspects of their business.

Also, in researching the above, I found out that not only is Ueda now a freelancer "dedicated to completing The Last Guardian," but the game's executive producer also left for social gaming studio Bossa Studios. Makes me wonder if Ueda's actions aren't a result of Sony's treatment. Either way, something happened to spark this exodus of top talent. Strange things are afoot at the Circle K, my friends.

Perhaps Japanese game devs are sick of the way Japanese games get made. It's been a common criticism for a while now.

Or Sony was getting tired of Ueda not being able to get a game made in a reasonable amount of time. Ico took so long it had to be bumped into the next console generation (PS to PS2), and Shadow of the Colossus took so long that it came at the tail end of its console's life-cycle. If Ueda left Sony because Sony was putting pressure on him to finish his game, my sympathies lean toward Sony. They announced this game over two years ago to great fanfare, and then: nothing. If I were them, I'd be leaning pretty hard on my director and producer as well.

All good points.

And that's not a bad theory, especially considering the state the industry is in now-- few companies can afford to fund such time-consuming projects like Ueda's tend to be, let alone actually want to fund such behavior. I am very curious what the circumstances really are, though-- time and money constraints at Sony were essentially the reasons Brendan McNamara and goons left Sony/were fired. But also knowing now what his management style is like, and that it wasn't just at Bondi but also Team Soho, there's a part of me that wonders if Ueda behaves similarly and Sony execs were simply fed up with it. Pure speculation/stream of consciousness, though. I guess it's more a fear that McNamara's behavior is more commonplace in my chosen profession than I'd like to think.

If it's truly scrapped, then my purchase of the PS3 (FINALLY!) has been delayed even further.

Read an update from Gamestop claiming they made a mistake, and that the game isn't cancelled. They decided to remove it from pre-purchase because the game lacks an official release date. That's what they said, taking back the cancellation.

Sony has said the game is not cancelled. I'll try and find the source, I found it some hours ago, but I'll post it when I find it.

I truly hope this doesn't happen. This is perhaps my most anticipated game in a looooong time.

While we keep getting "it's not cancelled" from Sony, I give you this: http://elder-geek.com/2012/08/sony-d...

No.... This can't be how one of the most unique and awesome gaming series dies...

I hope that's just an oversight on Sony's part.

It may well be cancelled, who knows, but the trademark thing doesn't mean anything. They have x years to renew it without anybody being able to snatch it from them (where x is either 2 or 3, read it somewhere but don't remember).

edit: oh, by renew it, I mean put out something that actually uses the trademark, not just file some paperwork. But they could put out any old placeholder thing that could vaguely be considered a video game (think half-ass tie-in interactive visual novel or something) just to hang on to it.

Last Guardian still in development according to Sony. Apparently they had to redo a lot of it. Not sure I buy that but it's at least nice to hear some official word on it.

"We had the game playable," Yoshida explained. "At one point we felt that it would be produced for a certain time period. That was the time we prematurely talked about the launch window. But it turned out the technical issues are much harder to solve. So the engineering team had to go back and re-do some of the work they had done."
Some have suggested the game has been switched from PlayStation 3 to PlayStation 4, which is reportedly due out late next year.

Hmmm. If it was in a playable state (I'm presuming finalised, feature-locked and not alpha/pre-beta) then this could either mean that they have a gameplay element(s) that's really interesting and hard to manage OR they did switch to PS4 like they did from PS1 to PS2 for ICO (and probably would have liked to for SoTC given how much smoother it is on PS3!).

They *claim* it's still a PS3 title. But anything could happen.

http://gamasutra.com/view/news/17659...

If this game ever comes out, I fear it will just be a big pile of lost potential. That makes me very sad.

A bummer too, because this game is maybe 1/3 of the reason I even bought a PS3.

Sony has just got to learn to hold off announcing new titles until they are in the final stretch (< 1year).

They've issued a correction and said the game is not on hiatus and is in active development. But they're still not showing anything.

http://www.polygon.com/2013/6/11/441...

I've had this preordered at amazon since 2009... I think I'll leave the preorder and see what happens.

Guaranteed for 56.99 or less, if it ever happens.

Schmutzli wrote:

I've had this preordered at amazon since 2009... I think I'll leave the preorder and see what happens.

Guaranteed for 56.99 or less, if it ever happens.

Given the hyperinflation we can expect to see by 2050, that's going to be a total steal. ;P

juv3nal wrote:
Schmutzli wrote:

I've had this preordered at amazon since 2009... I think I'll leave the preorder and see what happens.

Guaranteed for 56.99 or less, if it ever happens.

Given the hyperinflation we can expect to see by 2050, that's going to be a total steal. ;P

And he'll be the guy that gets a news article written about his Duke Nukem Forever receipt from 15 years ago.

Game 'has not gone away but is on hiatus'. Question comes up at 8:00

:(

EDIT: See below, not on hiatus.

At least it's [url=http://www.gameinformer.com/b/featur.... Sorry, it's not real news, but it's something.

With the curtain soon to close on the PlayStation 3 generation, is time for fans to give up hope on The Last Guardian ever coming out?

The team is still there in SCE Japan Studio, [Fumito] Ueda-san is still there, but we are still waiting for the time to reintroduce it.

Soo.... PS4 then?

Looks like PS4 may very well be the case:

http://www.ign.com/articles/2013/10/...

Oh man, first Half Life 3 gets copyrighted, now this...stop toying with my heart! I´ve been wanting this game since the moment the final end scene of SotC finished. I needed more from team ICO. Then the teaser hit on 2009, and I was floored. I really hope this happens in 2014. It would such an amazing and smart release from Sony. That game is a console-seller.

Amazon is taking pre-orders now. There's a lot of speculation that this is because Sony's tipped off retailers that this project will be releasing this year.

IMAGE(http://bachelorburnbook.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/02/stop-trying-to-make-fetch-happen.png)

Why would this launch as a PS3 game?? And damn I hope they keep the current cover art.. that's the bomb!