Ubisoft has been taking a note from Warner Bros. Discovery and been cutting projects in development left and right. Most estimates cite no less than seven to six games have been axed and the studio's much beleaguered Skull & Bones has been delayed a sixth time as well. While the identities of the canned games is still unknown, some were predicting that Beyond Good and Evil 2 was one such title that met its end this month considering the game has been perpetually stuck in development hell and its main figurehead, Michel Ancel, leaving the company while also implicated in Ubisoft's workplace harassment accusations and toxic leadership accusations while managing BGE.

However, in responding to questions from Eurogamer, a Ubisoft representative responded by saying:

"Beyond Good and Evil 2's development is under way and the team is hard at work to deliver on its ambitious promise."

It's crazy to think, but if Ubisoft are not lying, then the game has officially become the most delayed video game in industry history. In fact, if the project was in active development during 2022, it would have overtaken Duke Nukem Foreverway back in October 2022. To highlight that, the original "teaser trailer" for the game is set to turn 15 on May 28.

Oh, how time flies.

I can't see any way modern Ubisoft recaptures what fans of the first game would actually want from a sequel. But I guess I'll find out.... in my nursing home.....

@jeremyf: What do fans actually want in a sequel at this point?

When Beyond Good and Evil came out it was a competent stealth/3D Zelda game with a protagonist who was pretty novel in the industry at the time because she was a non-sexualized young woman. It had a fun world and story and some good side characters.

But this was like 5 years after Ocarina of Time and Metal Gear Solid (two seminal games that it drew from.) It was a completely different time in the industry. Even Zelda and Metal Gear (back when Kojima was making Metal Gear games still) totally changed in what they offered. So either Beyond Good and Evil plays like an extreme throwback to like 2005 era game design, which could be fun I guess but wouldn't make it worth the extreme wait, or it doesn't play anything like the original game, in which case why do we even need a sequel? Yeah the story had a lot of loose ends but by modern standards it isn't some seminal masterpiece. The wait is even longer than between the Avatar movies!

I have no idea why Ubisoft hasn't just canceled this with everything else. The IP was never a huge hit (I think the game was literally given away in cereal boxes at one point) and this is the opposite of striking while the iron is hot. The iron is frozen.

Beyond Good and Evil was a huge flop, they're not making a sequel for a handful of fans, 2 will be something else.

The only way it hasn't been cancelled is unless its too far along or most likely it tickets all the current Ubisoft boxes, openworld, GAAS and co-op etc.

remember when they were all trembling in their boots for Vivendi and made Ancel come back from his start up indie studio to stand on a stage pronouncing that their cult-classic would get a sequel and the shareprice after that show rose enough for Vivendi to drop the hostile take over?

And then they actually had to put some Beyond Good & Evil stuff in it, but the threat was gone and so was Ancel so why bother.

@thepanzini: Tom Clancy's Beyond Good and Evil 2. Jade has been kidnapped and a rag tag group of orphans have to squad up, arm themselves with real licensed guns, and rescue her. Fight off rival orphan squads played by other real players as you compete to rescue Jade. Earn IRIS network credits in game or buy them through microtransactions for cosmetics and access to the best equipment. Featuring a ripped from the headlines story about how the woke mob are all controlled by aliens you will thrill to play this game when it drops for IOS/Android in 2024.

At least Valve abandoned all talk about a Half-Life EP: 3 once it became clear that they were never going to make that game, because they didn't need to. Steam took off for them and became their primary cash cow. Ubisoft constantly teasing fans about a sequel to a game they like, knowing they will never make it is just cruel. The sad thing is, with the latest consoles, they actually have the means to deliver most of what they promised with the sequel, if not all of it.

@bigsocrates: Yeah, any discussion of “fans of the first Beyond Good & Evil” occupies the same space in my brain as when someone says like “the last surviving passengers of the Titanic.” You’re really talking about a pretty short list of human beings to begin with, and that list is getting dramatically shorter each year.

Nothing against the first game, but it was bizarre to announce a sequel at all, and then it’s a bizarre project for them to insist is still in development. If some team within Ubi really believes in the BG&E2 idea they have, then who am I to tell them to stop, but what an absolutely nuts business move to keep supporting this sequel to a game that nobody played.

@bigsocrates: You forgot the part about earning cosmetic wallet chain NFTs that can only be seen in the character menu.

I demand justice for/against the Cuss Monkey (which is almost 6 years old now).

@bigsocrates: I can't believe you had the pitch all along.

@bisonhero: The funny part is Ubisoft Montepiller is lead not only are they 400+ big but the folks responsible for Tom Clancy's Ghost Recon.

@bigsocrates: Luckily loose ends don’t have to be addressed, because this is supposedly a prequel! Or was, maybe that has changed by now…

I played through the original game in 2017 and thought it was okay, so luckily I haven’t been waiting since 2003, but it’s still a bummer how this whole thing has gone down.

I owned the original for Gamecube back in the day and I remember enjoying it but I honestly don't remember anything about it. I don't know if I should even care about a new entry or not. I can't remember.

I wonder how much money has been sunk into this game.

All those crowd sourced assets by Joseph Gordon Levitt gotta get into the hands of the public any day now.

I have no idea if this game will ever come out, but the last couple of trailers have been wild...

and this one..

Just make an animated short :)