The coming Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic (opens in new tab) Remake should be a while longer in coming.
The Aspyr development team announced that due to development problems, the remake should no longer be expected in the near future. Precisely, this seems to be due to the Vertical Slice, together with Sony and Lucasfilms, from the end of June.
The Vertical Slice is a short, demo-like presentation intended to demonstrate the most important functions of a game – and in this specific case it didn’t go over well at all. Noisy Bloomberg (opens in new tab) was even so dissatisfied that the studio managers have subsequently declared that the game will be put on hold for the time being.
But it gets worse: Shortly after the demo, design director Brad Prince and art director Jason Minor were fired from the project. Many developers were surprised by this, especially since it was assumed that the project was on the right track. However, not everyone seems to have shared this optimism…
Another tremor of power…
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Aspyr originally announced that the chances of releasing the Kotor remake by the end of the year were not bad. More realistic voices, on the other hand, spoke of a time frame around the year 2025 – a clear difference…
In view of the latest news and the ongoing series of new hires in various segments and positions, the second alternative also seems more likely to us.
It’s even possible that Aspyr will say goodbye to the project entirely. Parent company Embracer only announced in May that Aspyr will receive active support in the form of Saber Interactive, another subsidiary. Now the chances are not bad that the latter will even take over the development completely.
These messages join a growing smorgasbord of disruptions and negative messages. This includes the departure of ex-lead producer Ryan Treadwell in May and author Sam Maggs, who left after just 9 months disembarked in 2021 (opens in new tab). And with the game now on hold, the tension and uncertainty in the community is likely to continue to rise.
In addition to the success of the original title from 2003, the remake is so interesting because it could become the first modern Star Wars game to be developed outside of EA. So far, this was not easily feasible due to the current license agreement until 2023…
But even beyond Kotor, fans can – fortunately – look forward to one or the other project. For example, Respawn Entertainment has announced work on three titles, including the Jedi: Fallen Order sequel, Eat Survivor. However, they are also plagued by the consequences of the pandemic and development problems there, which is why the release was postponed to 2023.
We just want to say that there is still more than enough in the pipeline. Nevertheless, we hope that the release will not take place in a galaxy – and time – far, far away…
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