Update: VGC has also supported these claims with their own sources, adding that they too believe Everwild is a 2024 release.
Not only that, but it’s said that senior creative designer Gregg Mayles will now lead the project. Mayles credits include Banjo-Kazooie, Viva Piñata and Sea of Thieves - a healthy line-up of games. This was reportedly confirmed to VGC in a statement from the game’s executive producer, Louise O’Connor.
The team behind Everwild continue to shape a truly magical experience and remain focused and excited about creating a new game centred around a truly unique, new world. Gregg Mayles joined us, late last year as Creative Director, and the team has never been stronger. Since showing the world our Eternals trailer, we have been making progress on all aspects of Everwild. The team continues to work hard to realise our vision and to bring the magic of nature in Everwild to life for players around the world.”
According to VGC, the game was originally a third-person adventure game with “god game elements”. However, the team was reportedly struggling to create a clear vision for the title, which has lead to its reboot.
Whatever the case, it sounds like we’re a while away from even hearing about Everwild again, let alone seeing it in action. Until then we have the on-going support of Sea of Thieves, which is getting a substantial Pirates of the Caribbean expansion next week.
Original Story: Well, here's an interesting story you may or may not have heard before. According to Jeff Grubb - the same guy who says several heavy-hitters for Xbox won't be arriving until 2023, Rare's next big project Everwild was apparently rebooted.
He's said to have mentioned it a few times now, and it most recently popped up in his podcast. Here's exactly what he said, courtesy of a post over on ResetEra:
"I mean, it got rebooted, this thing had to get rebooted, everyone knows the creative director left and when he left they restarted production on that game, so it's ways off, it's currently scheduling a window of like 2023.....that game is scheduled to 2023 but there's a lot of stuff schedule to 2023 from XBOX so if there is any reason to push to 2024 it will get pushed, it's easily on the zone that this could happen."
Grubb briefly reiterated this in his own story over on GamesBeat:
"Of course, something like Everwild, which Rare rebooted, could easily slip into 2024 and beyond."
It's odd to hear him throw around the term "rebooted" so freely as there was no mention of this from Rare or the former creative director when they departed from the studio in October last year.
As a result of this apparent reboot, we might be waiting a while for Everwild (and a number of other titles).
What are your thoughts on this? When do you think we'll see Everwild? Let us know down below.
[source venturebeat.com]
Comments 37
Honestly, based on how they spoke about the game this might not be terrible. The previous director and others kept mentioning how it’s a beautiful world but they “don’t know what game it is yet”. Maybe this change will give it an actual direction so they know what game they are making now.
It's cool, take you time. Just make it a good game.
@xMightyMatt14x You nailed it, couldn’t agree more.
The last time they spoke about this, they wasn't even sure it what sort of game it was going to be. So it being rebooted and slipping to 2024 seems right.
Of all the games that MS announced last year and this, If there was one that was going to get the "scalebound" treatment, i'd pick Everwild, simply because we know nothing about it.
And this is why you should never announce games that are so far off.
oh god, im having metroid prime 4 flashbacks
@Chaudy "It's cool, take you time. Just make it a good game."
It's a great dream, but the cold reality is that sometimes projects just aren't good enough and should be stopped. Many games don't release for this reason.
I sincerely hope this isn't the case for this game, but if it is, for the team as much as anyone else, the sooner they find out the better.
I really wish the industry practice was to only show off things within a year of anticipated launch. I understand that it's done for "reasons" but sigh
I don't know if this is true, but if so I can't say I'm surprised. They literally said they didn't know what the game was even about. Not only is that a bad sign, but admitting it is worse lol
@BearyBad totally. I'm old enough to remember when you rarely heard about a game more than a year before it dropped, and often 6 -8 months before. I much prefer that to the 3-4 year heads up we're constantly getting now.
Not surprising but as everyone said, this is a game the studio didn't even know what it was. It seemed like a creative project for emotional art without ever figuring out what gameplay is actually supposed to be associated with the pretty world.
I'm sure the game was started out to be a Media Mollecule-like creative "experience" rather than a "game" - but instead it just became more of an art expo. Maybe they can make a game out of it but I see this as kind of a vaporware pipe dream more than a real product for now.
@armondo36 The problem is they started the 3-4 heads up (ok, lets be real, Sony mostly started that, though it did occasionally happen for popular franchises before them. Dragon Age was a web page on Bioware's website shortly after Baldur's Gate 2 released. They wanted everyone to know they were working on the spiritual successor of Baldur's Gate. Then Interplay scrwed them, then they ended up doing ME and Jade Empire for MS, then only got back to DA many years later.), and then after that it was caught in a cycle that to have new news they had to reveal things that weren't even started yet, because they already announced this year's news 4 years ago.
Oh Rare, how far you've fallen...
@armondo36 fully agree. I think the companies' outright lie to build the hype sometimes. Xbox might be the most guilty in my mind but an example is God of war Ragnarok, like no one thought it was possible with the year Sony stated and surprise surprise it was pushed.
Anyone else concerned about Xbox's managing of their games? Halo, Everwild, Scalebound, etc, canceled, rebooted, significant delays. I'd love for them to get better mangers in to keep things on track.
@themightyant However, they don't have to ditch everything. They can use the art and assets to make any kind of game so there is no need to cancel the project and erase the files, especially because it looks Disney and brings some needed variety.
@BlueOcean i'm not saying they should. Just saying that sometimes knowing when to cut your losses on a troubled project is the best option.
Unannounced games get shuttered or adapted all the time.
It's much harder when a game has been announced and had so much relative screen time than something that was never announced.
It always came across that even they didn't know what they were making, other than a stunning Fern Gully/Avatar type ideal.
Still I hope they manage to make it work, it looked utterly unique.
@NEStalgia I'm not sure that it got rebooted. Rare said after the first trailer that they don't know what to do with the "game". They wanted to do something online and cooperative and if the director left they can do what they haven't done until now, make a game. It's a bit sad that Rare will be focused on this single game for many years after many years focused on Sea of Thieves when they have so many IPs.
@themightyant The point is, they didn't know what to do about it since they first revealed it (someone interviewed them about it) so it's not something new. Now they just need a new direction and know what to do with what they have, and what they have is the art and assets and ambiguous ideas about the world and its spirits. They can just make a game, any kind of game, with that Disney style and that will be good for the Xbox game library.
@The_New_Butler I agree, but Sony seems to have a balance between letting teams have creative freedom but not letting them get lost in the weeds. I don't know if that's from hiring good people to manage or from being more hands on with deadlines and builds.
I want them to release amazing games without having to delay and reboot them frequently.
@BlueOcean Sure but don't you think that is a little messed up? Lets make the whole game for years and only much later start figuring out how to make... you know... an enjoyable gameplay loop and turn into an actual game!
I get that it is a unique project so maybe the normal rules don't apply as much, but it seems like a disastrous strategy from the start to me.
Regardless, as I said, I hope they make it work.
@themightyant I don't think that it's the best strategy either. As @NEStalgia, I believe that they focused on the art first and then wondered what to do with the nature, spirits and ambiguous gameplay ideas like online cooperation. They can basically make any kind of game with this art and even ditch the online ideas and make a single-player adventure which is what I would do!
@The_New_Butler I get that and I'm going to keep my Series X and Gamepass Ultimate sub, but it's just frustrating seeing them year after year keep us waiting "till next year." I'll wait, just getting old.
On another note, I hate acquisitions as consolidation hurts gaming competition (IMO), but why haven't they bought Moon Studios!
@Bdbrady @The_New_Butler "I think some of this stuff takes time to be honest." You've both made good points, it's an interesting discussion, but I think this is the fairest assessment.
I get the impression that while Sony is mostly hands off creatively they have a pretty tight leash on budgets, timescales and hitting milestones. Not on every project of course, but in general most of their studios launch at a relatively good rate, at a high standard. That last at least is clear to see. But as you rightly said some of this is time and trust and getting the right people in place.
@Bdbrady I get your frustration too. Though I though E3 was a success for MS, particularly Game Pass, many of the games I want most aren't going to appear until 2022, 2023 (and likely 2024), that is a little disappointing. (Though I'm glad they didn't show them if they so far off)
Re: Moon Studios. Because they don't want to be bought! They've said as much, they're proudly independent. (though that can change quickly with the right offer or correct timing)
@BlueOcean I'll take that single player one please too!!!
Hope it becomes a single-player game with the same art design.
Does anyone remember Wild or B.C.? I feel like these nature-themed games never come out. I feel like I'm forgetting another game, too.
Neverwild
Eh, since this isn't coming from MS I'm not going to react as if it's confirmed.
@themightyant I was once told by a dev that bad things happen when the artists run the company. They were referring to (old) Blizzard at the time. Before Blizzard North got torn apart and D3 re-imagined as WoW.
I sense that's what's happened to Rare. Nintendo has a very very "manufactured product" approach to game design. The design a gameplay loop FIRST in isolation, no brand or art of any kind attached. Then when they flesh out the gameplay they assign or create an IP for it and design the art around the play. That's their secret sauce. But "artist-driven" companies often come up with an art, design, theme, world, environment, characters, systems first, and then try to shoehorn gameplay into their creation. Everwild looks like the text book example of "why you shouldn't let artists run the game company."
If somebody grabs them and forces them into a 343-like refocusing, Everwild will be a forgotten memory with a new name and a real game behind it. If not....well...I can't wait for the DF comparison between it and Deep Down.
Sea of thieves is an amazing experience. Loved the banjo series and viva piñata. We all got time to wait. Would love to see a mix of sea of thieves and viva piñata. Some ever growing nature hike!
It's ridiculous that for all the amazing things Xbox is getting so right lately, they still after 20 years can't get anything right with Rare. I remember articles a few months ago stating how they had a world designed for Everwild but no gameplay direction?!?! Absolutely bonkers. The best thing Xbox have done with Rare was to re-release their old Nintendo catalogue onto the console. I absolutely used to love Rare back in the day, but they are just currently dead weight in the Xbox family.
I don't think everwild ever got a release date that being the case there is no such a thing as delay for games that never had a release date to begin with. Xbox is in a position they can release Everwild in 2024 with no problens as they have plenty of studios with projects in the works. 2021 has pretty good games coming in psychonauts 2, halo infinite, fh5 and flight sim, 2022 is packed with new games, including new first party IPs like, RedFall, Starfield, Contraband. 2023 is expected to have Perfect Dark, Avowed and others.we didn't see compulsion new project yet, so there is that too. Everwild can take the time it needs, Xbox will be just fine.
Game that never existed continues to not exist?
Rare really is just clueless when it comes to anything that isnt sea of thieves
@NEStalgia "bad things happen when the artists run the company." in 90% of cases (made up stat) this is true, across all forms of group produced art.
There are the 1%, usually seen as the Auteurs, who have enough knowledge in other important skillsets (like marketing, finance, trends, etc.) to sort of get by and not flush it all down the drain.
Then there's the 9% of artists/creatives in control who are smart enough to hire enough smart people around them, and crucially listen to them, to stop them from themselves.
But it's a tricky one as i'd love, in theory, to see more games that were artist/creative led and broke from the typical design by committee conventions.
This is more prevalent in the Indie and AA space, with smaller budgets and (sometimes) lower risks and is why I love indies so much. Generally more creativity and risks.
It's also what I've loved about Xbox, Sony (and others) supporting so many developers to make their creative visions, while keeping a careful guiding hand over the project, and assisting where needed.
@The_New_Butler Idk about Sony bud you could be right. I was just being critical of the Xbox boss on the Xbox site because of what he said about Xbox lol
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