Timesplitters 4 has been in development limbo for years now. Now a couple of ex-Free Radical employees are letting everyone know why publishers turned it down in '08. Co-creator Steve Ellis says that a demo was shown off to publishers following the release of Haze, their PS3-exclusive flop. Publishers that saw the demo prototype, however, simply were not interested.

"Timesplitters 4 was in the very early stages of development when Free Radical went into administration," Ellis said. "A small playable demo was shown to several publishers, but it didn't attract any publishing deals."

Karl Hilton, managing director at Crytek UK, says that the poor reception of Haze was to blame.

"We pitched it to a lot of publishers," Hilton said. "And from each of them we got the same two responses. Firstly, they would ask what happened with Haze. We were the company that made a series of high-rated shooters and then we had released Haze, which wasn't as well received. This worried them.

"Secondly, their marketing person would say something along the lines of 'I don't know how to sell this.' The unanimous opinion among all publishers that we pitched Timesplitters 4 to is that you can't market a game that is based around a diverse set of characters and environments - you need a clear and easily communicated marketing message, and Timesplitters doesn't have one.

"Perhaps they are all right. Perhaps this is why the previous games in the series achieved much more critical success more than commercial success. For these reasons, one by one they all declined to sign the project."

This is just sad.

[Via Nintendo Everything]

Tweet

66.7% of voters think this story ROCKS!

Vote Now!    (2) (1)