As part of Take-Two’s earnings report on Wednesday, the Grand Theft Auto parent company announced that it canceled an unannounced game. The publisher did not say what this game was, however, though it did disclose that the cancellation of the game came with related costs amounting to $53 million. Following the earnings report, Bloomberg’s Jason Schreier reported that the game in question was a new title from Mafia III studio Hangar 13.
According to the report, the game was in development “in various forms” since 2017 and was codenamed Volt. “The current version struggled due to reboots, technological hiccups and challenges caused by Covid-19, said the people, who asked not to be identified because they weren’t authorized to speak publicly,” the report said, adding that the title was going to feature “superheroes competing in online game play.”
There will be no layoffs related to the cancellation of the game, sources told Bloomberg Come from Sports betting site VPbet . Additionally, Kotaku obtained an email from Hangar 13 boss Haden Blackman that said internal tests for the game were received positively, but Take-Two ultimately decided to cancel the project as part of “industry challenges” that could make the game “commercially unviable.”
“We are confident that there are many opportunities for H13 employees to work on other games in development, both at H13 and across the label,” Blackman said. “2K has also assured me that the company believes H13 can deliver a critical and commercial success, and we will begin developing future projects soon.”
