Interestingly, however, Cliff Bleszinski – the now defunct Boss Key Productions’ co-founder, LawBreakers director, and the original Gears of War trilogy’s director – seems to be angling for a revival for the failed hero shooter.

Taking recently to Twitter, Bleszinski said that Nexon – LawBreakers’ original publisher – still owns the rights to the property, and tagging Nexon CEO Owen Mahoney, asked to “talk about a resurrection”. In follow-up tweets Blezsinski said that though he’s no longer in leading a project’s development, he would be open to being involved in a LawBreakers revival as a consultant.

Whether or not anything comes of this remains to be seen. The multiplayer shooter market is one that publishers are always looking for a foothold in, but the genre is also a crowded and competitive one, and has seen more than a few casualties over the years. Does the LawBreakers IP have enough cache to be able to compete in that space? Maybe that’s something that Nexon might be interested in looking into at some point down the line.

Well, turns out Nexon does own the rights to LawBreakers. @owenmahoney how about sliding into my DMs so we can talk about a resurrection?

— Cliff Bleszinski (@therealcliffyb) April 19, 2023

I'm over being CEO and lead designer. Shiz is exhausting.

But if a 3rd party wants to resurrect it with Nexon I'm down for consulting.

— Cliff Bleszinski (@therealcliffyb) April 22, 2023

DEAD RISING 4

The Dead Rising series had already suffered a bit of a dip with its third instalment, but Dead Rising 4 turned out to be the final nail in the coffin for what had at one point seemed like a major Capcom franchise. Unfortunately, it seemed like the game just never got what it was about the series that fans liked. From the questionable changes made to Frank West’s character to the ridiculously over-the-top tone that tried too hard to be funny, from poor design decisions (like the removal of timers) to disappointing boss fights, there was too much about the game that just didn’t work out.

The point is: Nothing is set in stone and people’s interests are constantly shifting. The battle royale shooter that everyone was playing last year may be a blip in a sea of more successful imitators. A hot new debut may fall by the wayside in a matter of months, if not weeks or days. Sometimes, even if you have a good idea, the timing of release can be one of the biggest factors preventing its exposure.

When Cliff Bleszinski left Epic Games in October 2012, it was somewhat surprising. On the one hand, the industry legend was instrumental to the creation of Unreal, which would lead to one of the best competitive FPS titles, Unreal Tournament. He also created Gears of War, a third-person shooter franchise that revolutionized the use of cover and became one of the flagship titles for the Xbox 360. With Gears of War 3 released in September 2011, Bleszinski’s departure was due to wanting a break from making games.

However, in 2014, he came out of retirement (as it were) and announced the opening of a new studio, Boss Key Productions. It subsequently announced a new free-to-play arena shooter code-named BlueStreak, published by Nexon. Very little was known, save for some concept art, but it felt like a throwback to Bleszinki’s roots.

In 2015, Bleszinski revealed that his break was motivated by a couple of factors, namely “gamers” feeling jaded and having worked with people at Epic who also felt jaded. The latter resulted in him pitching ideas to Epic and seeing them go nowhere. The company had sold the Gears of War IP to Microsoft in January 2014, and subsequently did little with Unreal Tournament, whose last major release was in 200. Its newest title entered alpha in August 2014 before receiving its final update in June 2017. Bleszinski’s frustration was understandable.

LawBreakers was pitched as a class-based arena shooter with zero-G gravity and a focus on twitchier shooting action. There were 18 characters split into nine roles and then further separated into two factions – Law and Breakers. Each had unique abilities and weapons, fulfilling different purposes in combat. However, this wasn’t necessarily a super-coordinated affair – you could very much lone wolf if you were good enough, retreating for a few seconds to restore health. Teamwork was encouraged, especially in modes like Blitzball and Occupy, but not mandatory.

While LawBreakers seemed intriguing, it already faced a major hurdle – Blizzard Entertainment’s Overwatch. Despite apparently being in development before Overwatch’s announcement – which is a whole other rigmarole, given the latter’s origins as Project Titan – Blizzard’s hero shooter was released first. Though it didn’t invent the hero shooter genre, the debut of the first major new IP in years for the company, combined with charismatic characters and sharp cinematics, immediately made an impact. Its closed beta period was also massively hyped, driven by fans desperate to get in.

The open beta saw nearly 10 million players jump in before its release in May 2016, and the overall gameplay was massively praised, even if some felt the content and features were a bit lacking. Such was its success that the more MOBA-esque Battleborn from Gearbox Software, which launched at the same time, quickly faded away.

Though its fundamentals and game speed were very different from Overwatch, LawBreakers nonetheless faced comparisons against the same. In June 2017, Bleszinski announced some major developments for the title that contributed to sealing its fate.

First, he confirmed that LawBreakers would be released for PS4 and PC, and not Xbox One. This caused some backlash, especially since Bleszinski was synonymous among Xbox players with the Gears franchise. However, he also confirmed that LawBreakers was no longer free-to-play – it would cost $30 at launch to play, making sure to emphasize that it was, “None of this $60 multiplayer-only bulls**t.” For reference, Overwatch cost $60 on consoles and $40 on PC.

LawBreakers had an open beta later that month on Steam with a second beta following in late July for PC and PS4. Unfortunately, there wasn’t much enthusiasm behind the same – the open beta saw low player numbers on Steam and the official release on August 8th had an even lower number of players. The reviews were solid but not exceptional. Though praised for its twitch shooting, many elements of LawBreakers just felt…fine. Nothing remarkable or memorable but fine overall, and the higher skill floor meant only a specific segment of FPS players would thrive.

But even if LawBreakers was an incredible game in its own right, Overwatch was still massively popular at this point, hitting its stride with new maps, heroes and cinematic shorts. Also, for its focus on coordination and team play, it was a lot easier for non-FPS players to get into. The charismatic heroes that dotted its marketing through the years only grew more beloved over time.

This isn’t to say that other hero shooters didn’t fare well – Rainbow Six Siege launched in 2015 and is still going strong today. But it was another genre that took the gaming world by storm in 2017, further drawing attention away from any potentially new competitive titles – battle royale. Epic Games quickly jumped on the bandwagon, using its PvE-focused Fortnite title as a base to create Fortnite Battle Royale. It garnered more than 10 million players just two weeks after its September 2017 release and, well, the rest is history. Various developers scrambled to release their own games in the genre with only a few seeing success.

Following pitiful player numbers since launch and the departure of Boss Key co-founder Arjan Brusse to Epic Games, Bleszinski finally released a statement in April 2018 acknowledging LawBreakers‘ failure. While Boss Key would release its own battle royale title – the abysmal and quickly forgotten Radical Heights – LawBreakers went free to play on Steam in June. Servers were then shut down on September 14th and the title was removed from purchase. The closure of Boss Key Productions occurred in May 2018 and Bleszinski has since retired from game development.

While the writing was seemingly on the wall for LawBreakers, some – including myself – had hoped that it could offer something unique and interesting to keep players engaged. Blame it on poor timing, lack of marketing, no free-to-play (something which even Overwatch has been forced to adapt with its sequel) or even its gameplay niche.

But to this day, LawBreakers is a testament to the fact that a “cool idea” and decent gameplay aren’t nearly enough to sustain a multiplayer title, especially in a highly competitive climate where trends can change on a whim.

Note: The views expressed in this article are those of the author and do not necessarily represent the views of, and should not be attributed to, GamingBolt as an organization.

Death Stranding Trailer Baffles Everyone – TGA 2017

It’s not like Kojima Productions’ Death Stranding was anything new at the time. However, we had only seen brief glimpses of what Hideo Kojima’s twisted mind was capable of delivering. At The Game Awards 2017, over 8 minutes of new footage was showcased and it arguably trumped everything before it. Shadowy figures, supernatural happenings – it was weird, to say the least.

Cliff Bleszinski, the creator of Gears of War, known most recently for the failed hero shooter Lawbreakers, has apparently posted in a very emphatic statement on Twitter in response to a fan that he will not be making any more games going forward. Bleszinski has always been an outspoken personality, and it looks like he is not holding back in this case.

Speaking in response to a fan complaining about never receiving a refund for Lawbreakers, a game that was taken offline in a little over a year, followed shortly by the closure of Boss Key Productions, Bleszinski noted how he spent money out of pocket to ensure his employees didn’t get a raw deal from the closing down of the company, and that the toxicity of the gaming community is the reason he will “NEVER” make another game again.

When informed by GamesIndustry that he was responding to what was likely a troll tweet (the account that tweeted at Bleszinski has so far made only this one tweet, and is likely a throwaway created expressly for this exchange), and asked how serious he was, he simply replied “I’m done”.

Bleszinski, for all his faults—he is abrasive and obnoxious—is at least a talented game designer, and if this is the note he will leave on, it is a shame. With that said, hopefully, this is nothing more than a minor outburst on social media on a bad day.

https://twitter.com/therealcliffyb/status/1063145769321013249

Hello Games – No Man’s Sky

Why not start off with arguably one of the most hated developers of the last few years? Hello Games released No Man’s Sky to tremendous fanfare but was immediately drowned in controversy for the lack of certain features like multiplayer. From there, the studio kept its head down, facing death threats and constant anger, before re-emerging with the Foundation update. This was followed by Pathfinder and Atlas Rises, both substantial updates that were also free. Finally, the developer brought full-on multiplayer with the NEXT update along with numerous improvements to base-building, exploration and so on. Community events are also on the cards and more free updates will be coming in the future.

LawBreakers is a game that seemed to just come out at the wrong time, and under-performed as a result of this bad timing. In fact, the game performed so badly that the developer Boss Key had to shut down earlier this year. However, instead of letting things lie as they are, a former executive at publishing company Nexon decided to add insult to the injury of the game’s failure.

Nexon America’s former Vice President of Marketing, Vlad Coho, was scheduled be delivering a talk titled ‘LawBreakers: How I Blew Millions Marketing the Biggest Flop of 2017′ at DevGAMM in Seattle at the end of the month. Based on the title, we can assume that the talk was going to be about what a mistake it was to bet on the game, and what he would have done differently.

Earlier this year, we learn that Nexon had faced some layoffs due to LawBreakers’ failure. Perhaps that is something Coho’s talk was going to dive into? It still seems in bad taste to phrase the talk in such a way that insults a former partner. Clearly, this is something Coho eventually realized as well, because Destructoid now reports that the DevGAMM talk has been cancelled.

“I have a ton of respect for the Boss Key Productions team,” Coho told Destructoid. “Games are a risky, difficult business even when everything goes well, and BKP did their best. My talk was going to be about my lessons learned from the mistakes I made, not about what the devs could have done better or differently. That said, out of respect for the BKP team, I’ve pulled the talk and won’t be mentioning LawBreakers or Nexon if/when I do speak at DevGAMM.”

Based only on the title of the talk (since we can’t possibly know what the actual content would have been), it seemed pretty apparent that a large part of it would have been about kicking something when it’s already down, so it’s good to see, at the very least, that that’s not going to happen anymore. What are your thoughts on this? Tell us in your comments.

So this is a total bummer.

Cliff Bleszinski has announced that Boss Key Productions, his gaming studio that he created four years ago, and which is best known for Lawbreakers and then, more recently, the battle royale game Radical Heights, which was launched in Early Access, is no more. The studio is effectively being shut down starting now.

In a sense, this news does not come as a surprise- Lawbreakers was, unfortunately, a rather dismal failure, and Radical Heights does not seem to have done better. It does come as a complete bummer, because Bleszinski is a passionate man, and the games seemed to be passion driven projects. Unfortunately, this also means that everyone who worked at Boss Key- 65 people- are now without jobs. I really hope they are able to get back on their feet again, and quickly.

Bleszinski did confirm that for now, servers for Radical Heights will stay up, for fans of that game, and thanked all the staff at Boss Key, as well as his fans, for their support.

Let’s hope he is able to rally from this setback, and come back stronger than ever. The creator of Jazz Jackrabbit and Gears of War deserves better.

https://twitter.com/therealcliffyb/status/996092708971274245

It was recently revealed that High Definition ports of Shenmue 1 & 2 would be released later this year as a single package for the Xbox One, PS4, and PC. Now, we’ve received some new information about what we can expect from these re-released titles.

The information was shared by YouTuber Adam Koralik. According to him, the games will be sold together for $29.99. While there will be a physical edition released for the PS4 and Xbox One, it will only be available digitally for the PC. Furthermore, we get to learn that it is D3t Ltd. who will be handling the release of these games. This is the same company which worked on titles such as Lawbreakers and Killzone: Shadow Fall. Finally, Koralik also revealed that Achievements and Trophies will be available with these games across all the different platforms.

While Koralik was able to learn much more about the game, he states that he is able to talk about only 5% of what he has learnt, so we’ll hopefully get to know more about the game later on. Shenmue 1 & 2 will be re-released later this year exclusively for the PS4 in Japan. In the US, the games will release for the PS4, Xbox One and PC later this year. You can check out Adam Koralik’s video below.

Lawbreakers wasn’t even a bad game. It was a multiplayer hero shooter that got caught in a vicious cycle of unnecessarily bad PR for no fault of its own, and bad timing. The game could never quite get the sales or concurrent players that presumably would have made it a success—and now, developers Boss Key Productions have announced they will be moving on from the game.

In a very earnest statement today, Boss Key Productions admitted that the game had failed to find an audience, and that they would be moving on from it. They stated that while a shift to a free to play design might seem like common wisdom in trying to turn around the game’s fortunes, it requires substantial enough resources that it is unclear if it will be worth it any time soon. They did say they will continue to support the game in its current state, and hope it gets the chance it deserves at success—but they have also confirmed they will be moving on to a new project, that they hope to share details on soon.

”Here is the very real truth, which may not come as a surprise,” their statement reads. “The fact is LawBreakers failed to find enough of an audience to generate the funds necessary to keep it sustained in the manner we had originally planned for and anticipated. And while a pivot to free-to-play may seem like easiest change to make, a change of this magnitude takes publishing planning and resources to do it.

“The team here has worked hard on this game over the past three and a half years and our studio is determined to give this game the second life it deserves. However, between now and then, we cannot sit idle. We will continue to support the game in its current state, but we also need to focus on other projects with fresh creative leaders. We have been working on something new and we can’t wait to share more about it! It’s a passion project that we’re in complete control of.”

It’s a shame the game cou;dn’t find its footing—it certainly wasn’t bad enough to be the kind of high profile failure that it ended up becoming. If you are interested in checking the game out, Lawbreakers is available now on PS4 and PC.