Platinum Games designer and Scalebound director Hideki Kamiya has apologized to fans on Twitter for the game’s cancellation.
On Monday, the news broke that Microsoft had cancelled Scalebound, the upcoming Xbox One exclusive action RPG. Microsoft issued an official statement at the time, but the normally outspoken director of the game, Hideki Kamiya, has been uncharacteristically silent.
But earlier today, Platinum posted a statement from its President and CEO, Kenichi Sato, on its official blog about the cancellation, saying,
“We’re sorry to say that on January 9, 2017, Microsoft Studios announced the cancellation of Scalebound. We are very disappointed things ended up this way, especially since we know many of our fans were looking forward to this game as much as we were.
Going forward, we will strive to continue delivering high-quality games to you, starting with NieR:Automata in March, and including products like GRANBLUE FANTASY Project Re:Link and LOST ORDER in the future.
We will keep working hard to meet your expectations and we look forward to your continued support!”
Shortly thereafter, Kamiya spoke on Twitter about the cancellation as well.
As you may have already heard, Scalebound has unfortunately been canceled. I'm very sorry to everyone who was looking forward to this game.— ???? Hideki Kamiya (@PG_kamiya) January 11, 2017
Sorry to bring you such bad news at the start of the year. All I can do for you is to promise to keep delivering fun games.— ???? Hideki Kamiya (@PG_kamiya) January 11, 2017
I'll work extra hard to never have to let you down like this again, so I hope you will keep watching over us in the future too.— ???? Hideki Kamiya (@PG_kamiya) January 11, 2017
I thought I would get lots of savage messages, but in reality I'm getting lots of warm messages. Thank you.
(ยด?_?`)— ???? Hideki Kamiya (@PG_kamiya) January 11, 2017
The statements seem to suggest that Kamiya expected a much more angry response than he received. The finality of the tweets also would seem to confirm that Scalebound isn’t likely to be picked up by another publisher. Of course, that could be due to IP issues, as it remains unclear who owns the Scalebound IP.
The next game Platinum is working on is NieR: Automata, which is scheduled to come to PC and PS4 sometime this year.