By now you've heard the news of the day; after rumors initially surfaced, the Xbox exclusive Scalebound has been canceled. It's a most unfortunate turn of events for Microsoft and (especially) Platinum Games, as the Xbox publisher moves on to bigger and better things while the developers are left to pick up the pieces after a lot of time just went down the drain.
Xbox head honcho, Phil Spencer chimed in on the cancellation over Twitter, calling the cancellation a "difficult decision." Here's the tweet:
@TiC_Podcast Difficult decision, we believe result is better 4 Xbox gamers, still disappointing. Im confident in 17 lineup thats our focus
— Phil Spencer (@XboxP3) January 9, 2017
What else is Spencer supposed to say really? It's the copy and paste PR damage control you always see across every kind of industry when things don't go according to plan. That doesn't mean that the sky is falling for Microsoft or Xbox, but the disappointment is certainly real. This is not the first Xbox One exclusive to bite the dust, as Fable Legends and the Phantom Dust resurrection have both fallen apart during the Xbox One's lifecycle as well. That said, Halo Wars 2 and Sea of Thieves are two very promising games on the horizon, so we'll see what happens from here on.
As for Platinum Games, the cancellation of Scalebound is surely felt even more so. The studio is still releasing Nier: Automata later this year, but as for projects beyond this year, it's hard to say. The studio's Wikipedia page cites a mobile game called "Lost Order" and a PS4 title codenamed "Granblue Fantasy Project Re:Link" as the projects still in the pipeline. But neither of those are as close or relevant as Scalebound was, at least at this point.
So long, Scalebound. We hardly knew ye.
Source: [Twitter]
