The Surge 2

Deck 13’s The Surge 2 was recently announced and will feature more open environments like a ruined cityscape along with engine improvements and better progression. The first game was met with a bit of acclaim despite some crazy difficulty spikes and lack of enemy variety. Either way, it’s good to see more choice in the hack and slash genre. Whether it comes out in 2018 or not remains to be seen.

So Beyond Good & Evil 2, the oft-delayed adventure platformer, is still coming. So says Ubisoft CEO Yves Guillemot while speaking to Geoff Keighley on YouTube Live (at 3:58). Do you believe him?

Guillemot noted that, “It’s still on the way. It’s something at one point you will see, yes.”

As for whether that will be sometime soon, he noted that, “It’s difficult to say, actually. Michel [Ancel] is working on it, but he’s doing two games at the same time. It’s coming along, but he has to spend more time on it so we can see it faster.”

It’s funny because rumours last year noted that Ancel is currently off the project. Hm.

Beyond Good & Evil 2 was first showcased in 2008 and revealed the return of someone who looked like former game’s protagonist Jade. Gameplay footage would leak the next year showing Jade actually outrunning authorities throughout a city. From there, Beyond Good & Evil 2 was delayed indefinitely. But maybe it could actually be out in our lifetimes? Here’s hoping.

File this under the “highly debatable” category. According to a report from Destructoid, Ubisoft’s Beyond Good & Evil 2 – which has been in development limbo for years – is set to be revived. The catch is that it will be funded by Nintendo for its mysterious NX platform.

Industry insider Geno essentially provided details to DualShockers about the same on Twitter with Destructoid coroborating the same through a different source. The working title for the game is apparently called “Beyond Good & Evil: The Prejudices of Philosophers” which is meant to be an “audience goodwill” project to win fans over.

While we would advise taking all of this with a large grain of salt, though Destructoid has been fairly good with its rumours in the past few months (remember Until Dawn: Rush of Blood for the PlayStation VR). What are your thoughts on Beyond Good & Evil 2 heading to the Nintendo NX? Let us know in the comments.

Michel Ancel may be busy with Wild and Beyond Good & Evil 2 may have had almost no progress since it’s initial announcement in 2008 but the director says it’s still very much alive. This was revealed in an episode of Devs Play hosting by Double Fine’s Tim Schafer and Greg Rice where Ancel was present to play the first Beyond Good & Evil.

In the episode, Ancel noted that his current thoughts about the original are a result of making a sequel. “Yeah, but it’s difficult because it’s hard for me to do the same kind of game two times. I always want to do something different.”

You can check out the episode below along with what Nintendo’s Shigeru Miyamoto thought about Beyond Good & Evil at E3 (spoiler: he wasn’t a fan according to Ancel).

What are your thoughts on the sequel? Would you still want to play it? Let us know in the comments below.

Rayman and Beyond Good & Evil creator Michel Ancel has recently founded his own indie studio with Wild Sheep Studio. It already has a game in development with 13 different staff members but that’s not the most significant news. Ubisoft has finally revealed that a sequel to Beyond Good & Evil 2 is happening and Ancel will be dividing his responsibilities between working at Wild Sheep Studio and Ubisoft Montpellier..

Speaking to Eurogamer, Ubisoft said, “In many ways, BG&E is an inimitable game – it appeals to all generations of gamers and is an inspiration behind many of Ubisoft Montpellier’s past and future games.

“It’s still far too early to give many details about this new title, but what we can say is that while Michel and the team at Ubisoft Montpellier are working with the core tenets of BG&E, they’re developing something that aspires to push past the boundaries of a proverbial sequel and leverages next-gen technologies to deliver a truly surprising, innovative and exceptional game. The entire team is excited about the direction this extremely ambitious project is taking, and we’ll have more to share later, as it progresses.”

Ubisoft’s Xavier Poix further said that, “In addition to spending some of his time on this new venture, Michel is leading the creative development of select projects at Ubisoft Montpellier, including an extremely ambitious new title that is very close to his and the team’s heart.”

Thoughts on Beyond Good & Evil 2 finally happening? Let us know in the comments.

Ubisoft’s Beyond Good and Evil 2 is perhaps one of the more bipolar vapourware titles in today’s industry – just when you think it’s gone, the dev team and director Michel Ancel do something to bring it back to life. Such is the case when, during a livestream with the development team, a viewer asked about the sequel and its current status. Ancel answered by showcasing the below image.

This concept art is very much in line with the look teased till now, especially in a target gameplay video that emerged some time in 2009. Jade appears to have taken a more Oriental yet subdued look this time around. So when is it coming out? That remains the mystery till now.

Beyond Good and Evil 2 is currently in development for PS4, Wii U, PC and Xbox One. What do you think of Jade’s look? Let us know in the comments, especially when compared to her green apparel in the first game.

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GameStop Germany has posted listings for Beyond Good & Evil 2 and a new Batman game online, with both games listed as arriving on the Xbox One and PS4. And before you get all skeptical, remember that this same site listed Tomb Raider: Definitive Edition for next gen consoles before it was officially revealed.

It wouldn’t be far-fetched to expect a new Batman game – it’s often been reported on and off that Rocksteady Studios is busy with the next game in Arkham series (Arkham Origins was handled by Warner Bros. Montreal). But even if it’s announced some time this year, it may be a stretch to expect it earlier than 2015.

As for Beyond Good & Evil 2, the game has been in constant flux since its initial announcement way back when. Creator Michel Ancel has confirmed that it’s alive though but it’s been a long time since we’ve seen or heard anything new regarding it.

What do you make of the above? Let us know in the comments.

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Speaking about visiting visual effects studio Weta Digital, which worked on The Lord of the Rings Trilogy, Ancel stated that, “We visited the studios in New Zealand. We discovered they were working closely with the programmers in order to avoid too much repetitive work done by humans. I think it’s very interesting to see how much you can integrate and put artificial intelligence in the tools so you can really order the computer to do things. It’s a very interesting way of working, to see where and how humans are involved in creation [and where the computer takes over].”

Ancel also confirmed that the same techniques could be used for Beyond Good & Evil 2. “Of course. There’s not so much difference between the two because, as soon as you start the process of sharing human [development] with the computer, you can translate that to more complex games. We have done research and it’s something we are working on, but I can’t mention too much about that.”

Could it be used to for larger-scale operations? “For sure, we’re doing research that could help even for bigger games. We believe we can achieve big games even with this size [of studio]; more could be done by the computer and we can focus on the really important things done by real people.

“The content and the quality of the content will be different. That’s something we’ve learned with our tools on Rayman Legends; in fact, those tools improve the quality. It was also funny to see how many people in the team can create content with the tools. Sometimes in [this business] you say, ‘Oh, this veteran is better than this young guy,’ but what if the veteran is only better at the technical things?

“When those two people are using tools that are easy to use, technical things don’t matter; it’s more the imagination and ideas that are very important. But we need to practise and use the tools, and now that Rayman Legends has been finished, we are going to move back onto triple-A games with those tools. I think it could be very interesting to talk about it in a year, and to see how far we’ve come.”

Now when will we be seeing Beyond Good & Evil 2? Lord knows, but at least it’s still in the domain of public discussion.

Speaking to Eurogamer, Ancel explained how there would be more freedom to explore the world around you in the sequel. “In Beyond Good & Evil 1 at first it was a full planet, you could go to the North Pole and see the eternal day.

“But we had to limit it as we were only 35 people. We couldn’t fill the whole world with all the things we wanted. We were frustrated at the end of BG&E1, and when we started the sequel we started again with this idea – you’re free and can investigate and travel the world as much as you want.”

This isn’t to say the game is going distinctly open-world in the sand-box style of games like The Elder Scrolls, but it does lend more opportunity for fleshing out the game world and mythos surrounding the series.

Ancel stated that, “I think [on current platforms] Beyond Good & Evil 2 was possible, but it’d be painful. It’s always possible to do anything on any kind of console, but sometimes you need to spend your energy not on the optimizations or things like that.

“Now that we have the [new] consoles around the corner we’re working on them. We’re trying to see how we can get the power out of those consoles because there are still things we need to understand on those consoles, but yes, Beyond Good & Evil is a project I always have in mind and I hope good things will come for this project very soon”.

Does this mean we’ll be seeing it on the PS4 or Xbox One in the near future? If Mirror’s Edge could return after a long wait, then why not? Keep the hope alive, people.