Perfect Darkhas been cancelled. The FPS reboot, which was in development since 2018, died yesterday with its developer, The Initiative. It was just one casualty in a day of sweeping layoffs at Microsoft. More than 9,000 employees have been cut, and the bloodbath also reportedly claimedEverwild, the next game fromSea of ThievesdeveloperRare, with deep cuts at Zenimax and King, too. Given the sheer number of layoffs we’ve already seen this year, it adds up to a dark present and unclear future for the games industry.
But Perfect Dark being cancelled would be hard to stomach on any day. I’m not a long-term fan of the series. I never played the N64 game back in the day, and have still only tooled around with the first level via the Xbox version. I never played Perfect Dark Zero on Xbox 360, either. I was solely excited for the new Perfect Dark on the strength of what we had seen from the reveal showcase.
Though, unfortunately, it seems thetrailer involved some heavy smoke and mirrors that obscured how far along the game actually was.
Perfect Dark Looked So Ridiculously Promising
Thegameplay trailershown off at theXbox Games Showcasein June of 2024 was one of the best trailers I’ve seen for any game in the past several years. Its only real competition is the two glimpses we’ve had ofGTA 6, and even then, Perfect Dark managed to generate hype without being part of one of the best-selling franchises in history. It just looked really,reallyfun to play.
The trailer, which combined the strategic stealth ofHitmanandDishonoredwith the kinetic parkour traversal ofTitanfall 2andMirror’s Edge, was loaded with the kind of details that give you that ‘Ineedto play this game’ feeling. Joanna recorded a guard speaking, then uses his voiceprint to unlock a door. She shot a sack of flour to create a smokescreen that blinds an enemy. She slid down a gutter, ran on walls, tackled an enemy from the air, and shot two opponents while simultaneously holding one she tackled in place on the ground. She could see through doors, enter slo-mo, and slide through tight spaces without losing a step. It looked think-y and fast, tactical and visceral, all at the same time.
The graphics were impressive, too, with hazy particle effects, realistic plant growth, and pockmarked walls.
I Need To Play That… But I Can’t
At their best, gameplay trailers get your imagination going, likeTears of the Kingdomshowing off how Ascend allowed you to swim through rock orSuper Mario Bros. Wonderhighlighting how Wonder Flowers drastically changed the level. They show you hints of mechanics and levels and how the story will intertwine throughout. They set your mind racing. The Perfect Dark trailer did that and made it look easy — much easier than the game’s tortured seven-year development would suggest it was to pull off.
As the average triple-A development cycle grows longer and longer, cases like Perfect Dark become more and more common. Sure, there were games likeDuke Nukem Forever,The Last Guardian, andFinal Fantasy 15in previous generations, but those decade-long dev cycles were rare. Now, they’re increasingly common.Grand Theft Auto 6,Suicide Squad: Kill the Justice League,Concord,Skull and Bones,and other recent games spent the better part of a decade in development.
In that environment, games like Perfect Dark (andWonder Woman, and Everwild, and Wild, andHyenas) never seeing the light of day is the cost. If a game might not make back the cost of that protracted time in development, the simple math might say it makes more sense for publishers like Xbox to cut their losses. We’ll never know how many incredible games we missed out on because the math didn’t work out in their favor.
