Beyond Good & Evil 2 creative director Fawzi Mesmar has responded to Ubisoft’s sweeping company reshuffle that resulted in the cancellation or delay of a swathe of game projects, as well as studio closures and layoffs — including a further 200 job losses proposed at the company’s Paris headquarters this week.
Writing on LinkedIn, former DICE veteran Mesmar assured fans of Ubisoft’s long-in-development Beyond Good & Evil 2 that the project had not been impacted in the restructure, as had previously been expected. Still, the developer said he was “saddened” by the reorganization’s effects on his colleagues across the wider company.
With an on-again, off-again development stretching back almost two decades, Beyond Good & Evil 2 remains an ongoing project within Ubisoft, led by its French team based in Montpellier.
“Thank you for everyone who has reached out to me over the past few days in regards to recent news at Ubisoft,” Mesmar wrote. “Myself, my team and our project Beyond Good and Evil 2 are unaffected by the recent changes. I would direct you to the official press release for more information around the latest organisational structure.”
This press release was the one which laid out Ubisoft leadership’s vision for the company to be split into five “Creative Houses” that lump the publisher’s many franchises into groups loosely based around their genre and audience.
Last week, Beyond Good & Evil was announced as being part of Creative House 4, a group dedicated to narrative driven and fantasy-orientated series that also includes Anno, Might & Magic, Rayman and Prince of Persia (though not the Prince of Persia: Sands of Time Remake, which was canned).
“Needless to say, I am saddened by the cancellations that has affected my colleagues in other parts of Ubisoft and the industry,” Mesmar continued. “I urge everyone — myself included — to offer support whenever and however they can during these times.
“We remain committed and focused on delivering a remarkable game for our players to enjoy,” he concluded.
Beyond Good & Evil 2 originally begun early development in 2007, with series creator and Rayman mastermind Michel Ancel on board alongside the majority of the Montpellier team behind the first Beyond Good & Evil game. Development was put on the back burner while Ancel’s team worked on other projects, but Ubisoft re-announced the game with fanfare in 2017 and showed off an in-engine concept featuring space flight and designs to feature multiple solar systems and planets.
Again, however, development struggled — and the project was further impacted by Ancel’s departure from Ubisoft and the sad death of its subsequent creative lead Emil Morel. But the last couple of years have seen work coalesce once more, with the sequel’s characters given intriguing cameos in the new Beyond Good & Evil 20th Anniversary Edition, and the hiring of Mesmar as creative director to steady the ship. That said, 20 years on from the original, there remains no word on when its follow-up will launch.
Earlier this week, an actress believed to have been working on the Prince of Persia: Sands of Time Remake said that she had lost three years’ worth of work and discovered her project had been canceled after her brother read about Ubisoft’s shock decision online.
Tom Phillips is IGN’s News Editor. You can reach Tom at [email protected] or find him on Bluesky @tomphillipseg.bsky.social
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