Video games are notorious for announcing themselves to the world and then disappearing into the aether, or in some occasions are hinted at by developers or speculated on by fans and become a part of the cultural zeitgeist. The poster boy for 'games you will never play' is of course Half Life 3/Half Life 2: Episode 3 (Delete as appropriate, they're basically the same thing anyway and you will never play it). But today's shocking blog post from HL3/HL2:E3's ex-lead writer Marc Laidlaw essentially tells an in-character story of the events that would bring the Half Life franchise to a close. At this point, it's essentially fan fiction, but this level of depth coming from the lead writer of the now-assumed dead game has lit the flames of interest in the meme-ified not-game once again.
But it's not the only game you may never play, there are tons more! Here are 5 of them:
But it's not the only game you may never play, there are tons more! Here are 5 of them:
Dead Island 2
Image Credit: gamerevolution.com
This is probably the prime contender for a game that you may actually get to play at some point, but the road so far has been rockier than Sly Stallone eating rocky road ice cream on the steps of the Philadelphia Museum of Art. In 2012, after developing the original title, developers Techland passed on the opportunity to make a sequel, instead opting to work on Dying Light, which is a game that came out that you can play. Between then and the games official announcement at E3 2014, the development was picked up by Yaeger Development, only to be dropped a year later when publishers Deep Silver booted them from the project. Since then, Sumo Digital have been given the go ahead to make the game, but given their deal to also develop Crackdown 3, it's unlikely we'll even hear anything about Dead Island 2 until after that game comes out.
Likelihood: Middling, as Sumo have only had the game for just over a year. If people still care about Dead Island in say 2019, we may see it released then.
Likelihood: Middling, as Sumo have only had the game for just over a year. If people still care about Dead Island in say 2019, we may see it released then.
Soul Calibur 6
Image Credit: neogaf.com
The as-yet-unannounced-yet-still-heavily-speculated-by-fans sequel to 2012's Soul Calibur 5 is pretty much the only fighting game franchise that hasn't resurfaced. Since the last game's release, we've had Street Fighter 5, Tekken 7, Killer Instinct, Mortal Kombat X, Injustice 2, Super Smash Brothers WiiU & 3DS, King Of Fighters 14 and the upcoming Marvel Vs Capcom Infinite. However, SoulCal6 has been oddly dormant. The franchise's 20th anniversary came and went without so much as an indication that a new game was on the way, and the franchise's efforts at keeping the series alive with 2014's online-only game Soul Calibur: Lost Souls went defunct after just a year of operations.
Likelihood: Low, seeing as Lost Souls was such an underperforming mess, but never say never. We were made to wait years upon years for KOF14 and Tekken 7. These things are sent to try us.
Likelihood: Low, seeing as Lost Souls was such an underperforming mess, but never say never. We were made to wait years upon years for KOF14 and Tekken 7. These things are sent to try us.
WiLD
Image Credit: playstation.com
Never heard of this game? It's probably because the creative mind behind it, Michel Ancel, was wrangled back to Ubisoft to make another game that could have easily made this list until this years E3: Beyond Good and Evil 2. However, since that game now officially has the green light and will probably make stupid amounts of money from nostalgia alone, that leaves Ancel's other game WiLD almost dead in the water. Beginning development in 2014 by Wild Sheep Studios, the game was announced in 2015 at Paris Games Week and was hardly head about after that. In January of this year, Ancel posted to his Instagram account supposed screenshots of the game, but has been suspiciously silent since then. Clearly, Beyond Good and Evil 2 was the game he would rather make, and Ubisoft would be pretty stupid to allow something that generates a mass amount of interest to not be made.
Likelihood: Low, perhaps it's possible that the game can be completed without Ancel whilst he works on BGAE2, but if Ancel is vital to the project, as it would seem he has been since 2014, then I wouldn't put money on Wild Sheep being able to sustain a few years more without him.
Likelihood: Low, perhaps it's possible that the game can be completed without Ancel whilst he works on BGAE2, but if Ancel is vital to the project, as it would seem he has been since 2014, then I wouldn't put money on Wild Sheep being able to sustain a few years more without him.
Tekken X Street Fighter
Image Credit: toptiertactics.com
"But Mike, we've already played this game!", you cry. Half truths, friends, you have played Street Fighter X Tekken, the first of the joint partnership games between Capcom and Namco announced in 2010. Capcoms game, however, did actually come out in 2012 to a less than celebrated release. It was faced with several controversies, particularly regarding paywalls for 'DLC' characters that were already on the disc and for omitting game modes from the Xbox 360 version of the game and refusing to add them back in. Capcom would then later go on to learn nothing and do the exact same shit with Street Fighter 5, but still got its corporate anus tongued by rabid fans anyway. For Namco, however, their crossover game is yet to see the light of day, despite reportedly having its art assets and engine completed. Since then, they have released Tekken 7, so it looks like the franchises are done playing nice and are back to bitter rivalry.
Likelihood: Low to non-existent, seeing as it's doubtful Namco will want to dig up assets from a 7 year old game and end up releasing said game almost 10 years after its announcement. Besides, it would probably sit in arcades for a further 2 years before anyone outside of Japan got to play it anyway.
Likelihood: Low to non-existent, seeing as it's doubtful Namco will want to dig up assets from a 7 year old game and end up releasing said game almost 10 years after its announcement. Besides, it would probably sit in arcades for a further 2 years before anyone outside of Japan got to play it anyway.
Agent
Image Credit: dualshockers.com
The blemish on Rockstar North's otherwise pristine, sumptuous arse, Agent was initially announced in 2007 and revealed it's title in 2009. Since then, nothing. Nada. Fuck all. At least from Rockstar themselves anyway. In 2015, an artist from the project leaked some screenshots from an early build of the game online, but they were pulled form the artists resume than a year later for legal reasons. Since 2007, Rockstar have been continually renewing the trademarks for the game, but that's almost all they've done. For 10 years solid. At this point, they may as well rename the game 'Sleeper Agent', as it;s unlikely it will ever be woken up.
Likelihood: Non-existent, this game is deader than the dodo-only Myspace Chernobyl meet-up. Which is to say it will never, repeat, never be released. Rockstar North are making massive bank off GTA: Online and Rockstar Studios have Red Dead Redemption 2 on the way. It's clearly an abandoned game and considering that there is almost certainly no crew working on it, it's safe to say that this title is one you will never play.
There has to be some games I forgot, 5 is just too small of a number. Sound off about some still-in-development games that you think will never see the light of day in the comments or on Facebook or Twitter!
Likelihood: Non-existent, this game is deader than the dodo-only Myspace Chernobyl meet-up. Which is to say it will never, repeat, never be released. Rockstar North are making massive bank off GTA: Online and Rockstar Studios have Red Dead Redemption 2 on the way. It's clearly an abandoned game and considering that there is almost certainly no crew working on it, it's safe to say that this title is one you will never play.
There has to be some games I forgot, 5 is just too small of a number. Sound off about some still-in-development games that you think will never see the light of day in the comments or on Facebook or Twitter!
By Mike Owen
@ThatMikeOwen
The Editor in Chief of Foul Entertainment, Mike edits most of what you see on the site. He runs the production of our podcasts, and currently pens Pop Culture Club and The Death of Video Games
@ThatMikeOwen
The Editor in Chief of Foul Entertainment, Mike edits most of what you see on the site. He runs the production of our podcasts, and currently pens Pop Culture Club and The Death of Video Games