At the end of last month, Bloomberg reported that the development of Aspyr Media's remake of Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic was on indefinite hold. But recently, a new report from the same publication has revealed that the development of the game has now shifted to one of Saber Interactive's Eastern European studios.
The remake of Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic was first teased in 2021 with a short teaser trailer, but since then has been subject to various development issues that have caused delays.
Last month, for instance, Bloomberg reported that the art director and design director were let go unexpectedly from the company. And that, though the license holders had responded positively to a vertical slice of the game, the leadership had communicated to staff that the project wasn't where it needed to be, leading to the project being put on hold.
Now Bloomberg has reported that Aspyr is no longer working on the remake, with development having moved to another set of studios owned by the Embracer Group. Last week, Embracer teased this news in a financial report, stating that one of its big titles had transitioned to another studio within the group but stopped short of identifying what the game in question was. Bloomberg confirmed in its most recent report, however, that this was indeed a reference to Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic.
At the time, Embracer stated that it was not expecting any "material delays" from this transition, but as Bloomberg highlights it's likely this move will cause delays as the new developers will, in the best possible scenario, have to adapt to unfamiliar code to salvage what has already been created.
This will likely be devastating news to those inside Aspyr, who worked on the project, as well as any Star Wars fans who had high hopes for this remake back when it was first announced.
What is your reaction to this latest bit of industry news? Let us know below
[source bloomberg.com]
Comments 1
It’s a sad situation. Aspyr did the Mac, mobile and Switch ports of KOTOR so they undoubtedly knew the original game very well and should have been quite well placed to know what elements a KOTOR remake would need.
That said, they’ve always been a company that does ports, so making a new AAA game from scratch was maybe just too much for them to handle. That said, the pandemic hit around when they’d have been going into full production, so trying to scale a team up who all work from home can’t have helped.
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