Zone of Enders sequel cancelled, team disbanded

Metal Gear creator Hideo Kojima has abandoned his Zone of the Enders sequel project and dismantled its entire development team, leaving the future of the series in doubt.

Kojima announced the project's cancellation last night during his radio show (thanks, Siliconera), and explained that he had been left disappointed by the recent Zone of the Enders HD Collection.

The compilation shifted the fast-paced action series from 30 frames per second to 60 and simply wasn't smooth enough, Kojima continued, apologising to fans for the change.

http://www.eurogamer.net/articles/2013-05-03-kojima-scraps-zone-of-the-enders-sequel-project

A sequel in the distant future hasn't been completely ruled out, but realistically, its not going to happen (ZOE2's sales were awful and MGS is a license to print money).

Zone of Enders was far from perfect but it was the first game to boast 3D action as smooth and tight as the best 2D games (it hit a bit before DMC1). ZOE2 was a masterpiece. Once the PS3 version of the HD collection has been patched, I will certainly pick it up (though if given the option to buy just ZOE2 digitally, I would take it).

Just read about this a few minutes ago. I literally screamed "NOOO!"

Just read about this a few minutes ago. I literally screamed "NOOO!"

Jehuty08

I imagined you doing this before I even clicked on the topic :P

WHY!? :cry:

I enjoyed ZoE2 so much...

that sucks.

[QUOTE="Jehuty08"]

Just read about this a few minutes ago. I literally screamed "NOOO!"

Darkeroid2212

I imagined you doing this before I even clicked on the topic :P

I was going to, but Carnage got to it first :P

I'm actually pissed at this. I was looking foward for ZOE3 so much!!

Awww I was actully curious if there was going to be a Zone of the Enders 3 :(

You know, I wasn't really aware that there was a ZOE sequel in the works. It's still too bad to hear that it's been canned, but at least it doesn't sting as much.

It's okay, I'm sure Kojima's fine with more Metal Gear games. Forever and ever.

Kojima announced the project's cancellation last night during his radio show (thanks, Siliconera), and explained that he had been left disappointed by the recent Zone of the Enders HD Collection.

The compilation shifted the fast-paced action series from 30 frames per second to 60 and simply wasn't smooth enough, Kojima continued, apologising to fans for the change.CarnageHeart

[QUOTE="CarnageHeart"]Kojima announced the project's cancellation last night during his radio show (thanks, Siliconera), and explained that he had been left disappointed by the recent Zone of the Enders HD Collection.

The compilation shifted the fast-paced action series from 30 frames per second to 60 and simply wasn't smooth enough, Kojima continued, apologising to fans for the change.MirkoS77

How do the previous games have anything to do with whether a new one will be made? I'd think the only thing that would determine that would be developmental and economic considerations, neither of which he's suggesting are the reasons. I fail to see how technical flaws of past games/HD transitions hold anybearing on the production of future ones. I'm a bit at a loss at to his reasoning here because what's done is done.

Makes no sense.

The action of the HD games was much more sluggish than that of the originals (it will take a more technically savy man than me to explain why increasing the framerate worsened the control in this instance) and the PS3 version suffered from a lot of bugs which causes it to freeze at odd moments.

Why would a botched HD version impacted the sequel? Possibly because ZOE2's sales were terrible, something Kojima has blamed on timing and other non-game related factors. IIRC it was once stated that Konami was using the sales of the HD collection to gauge the appetite for an original game in the series. The fact that the HD collection was botched (and to the best of my knowledge, didn't sell well) hurt ZOE3's chances.

Also, its possible that as with MGS Revengeance (which was eventually handed to Platinum) the internal team handling it was incompetent in ways that we the public will never see.

this is bad news.

I'm glad he recognized how sh*t the HD collection was. I was literally shocked when I played ZOE2, it was like Jehuty was moving through molasses. Awful, just awful. They really need to retool it and get back out in individual form. ZOE is nostalgic, ZOE2 is actually still a great game.Buckhannah

That's what happens when you give anything to High Voltage Software.Minishdriveby

Zone of the Enders is a series with the potential to be great. Zone of the Enders 3 development and production ending by cancelling is disappointing and even more so because the Zone of the Enders HD collection does not play well at 60 frames per second and not because the series is lacking in fun factor. I wish Hideo Kojima will give the sequel another chance maybe with another team. Zone of the Enders  The Second Runner is one of the best games of the PlayStation 2 library.