According to a Bloomberg report, the game just isn’t progressing as well as it should be. To date, the project has lost two key personnel: Brad Prince (design director) and Jason Minor (art director). Bloomberg added that its sources said that Aspyr held several meetings in July to tell employees that it will have to pause the game’s development. As if this wasn’t bad enough, the same sources confirmed that the current predicament has forced Aspyr to push back the game’s timeline from a late 2022 release to 2025.
Apparently part of the reason for the lengthy delay is the “vertical slice”. This is effectively a demo that showcases all the game’s intended features. Aspyr’s heads weren’t happy with what they saw after the development team spent so much time making it. For now, it’s still unclear what the status of the KOTOR remake is. Bloomberg’s report claims that Aspyr is looking for other projects to work on in the interim. It is possible that work on the KOTOR remake will be transferred to a different developer if not canceled entirely. But, until we hear official word from Aspyr Media, LucasFilm Games, and Sony, let’s assume that the KOTOR remake is still on the docket. On the off chance that the KOTOR remake doesn’t happen, the cancellation will affect the progress of other Star Wars games. We’ve already heard reports that Star Wars Eclipse isn’t coming until 2025 while Skydance New Media hasn’t revealed its Star Wars game yet. If all parties involved cancel the KOTOR remake, other studios might have to delay their projects out of fear that they might suffer the same fate. This is good news in the long term as this will force developers to raise the quality of their games. But, this would imply that we won’t see Star Wars Jedi: Survivor in March, the earliest, as per the latest leaks. Sony is expected to hold another State of Play showcase in September. Most likely, we will hear more about the KOTOR remake at the event or around the same time, regardless if work is still ongoing or not.
