A fresh X post from Christofer Sundberg, co-founder of Avalanche Studios and CCO of Liquid Swords, has poured cold water on hopes for Just Cause 5. Responding to chatter around the studio’s canceled projects, he said the series’s next mainline entry is effectively off the table because the creators who defined it have largely moved on. As he put it on X: “#JC5 would be a no-go since extremely few from the original team are there still.”
Sundberg also reflected on where things went wrong with Just Cause 4, noting that internal dynamics and external pressures dulled the series’ edge: “The problems with JC4 was partly me (unwillingly) moving away from creative leadership to more corporate crap, publisher problems, team composition and roles and more.” He added a broader critique of Avalanche’s current posture: “They need to find the fire again, take risks, piss people off and make games the rest said was impossible.”
His comments arrived amid renewed interest in Contraband, the Avalanche-developed Xbox project that surfaced in 2021 and was later halted. Sundberg clarified his role in its origins: “Me and my team pitched Contraband back in 2017 to Microsoft (and signed it). It’s changed quite a lot since then, obviously.” Reports this year confirmed that the game was shelved, followed by studio cost-cutting moves.
Bottom line: Just Cause wasn’t only a toolset. It was a philosophy of gleeful excess built by a specific crew, and without it, Sundberg argues, a numbered sequel risks becoming a brand exercise instead of a proper escalation, and that’s something he’s not willing to endorse.
