It seems that something of an accident happened over at Ubisoft a couple of days ago. As reported by PC Gamer, someone at the publisher somehow managed accidentally release an early version of the as yet unannounced (at the time) remaster for Beyond Good & Evil. How this happens? I doubt anybody knows, but let’s dig into it anyway!
So, it’s looking like this was sort of the culmination of a series of leaks leading up to the official (albeit forced) announcement of Beyond Good and Evil 20th Anniversary Edition. First, there as an ESRB leak showing the first evidence that this project existed, then Xbox achievements got out there somehow along with an Xbox store listing. Then there was this last and greatest leak: the game’s appearance on Ubisoft+. Some even managed to download, play and upload 30 minutes of gameplay to YouTube before Ubisoft managed to clamp down on the leaked build and claim the video. The publisher then proceeded to attempt to scrub all mention of it from the internet, but that is, as we all know, an impossible task.
So, here we are; Beyond Good and Evil 20th Anniversary Edition is officially announced. No official details are out there yet, but Twitter user Wario64 managed to get some stuff from the store listing before it got scrubbed. It seems that it may offer a 60fps/4K experience with improved graphics and some sort of new quest (which PC Gamer speculates is a tie-in to Beyond Good & Evil 2). By the way, 60fps is what Beyond Good and Evil HD (PS3/Xbox 360) ran at, so they’d better hit that mark at least.
I find it hard to believe that a development build of a game can just wind up live on a publisher’s subscription service, but I guess we don’t have much choice to believe that that’s really what happened here. Odd circumstances aside, I’m actually sort of surprised that Ubisoft didn’t just port Beyond Good & Evil HD to the newer systems.
I mean, I guess that they wouldn’t be able to justify full price if they did, but still. Short of a full, Dead Space-style remake, there’s really not a whole lot they can do here. A possible new quest tie-in to Beyond Good & Evil 2 is cool and all, but is it really enough to justify a mere remaster (assuming that Ubisoft will be charging full price)? Also, if the sequel turns out bad (if it happens at all), would fans really want a version of the original stained by a reference to it? Honestly, I’m not sure.
How about you? What’s your tke on this whole situation? Are you still holding out hope for Beyond Good & Evil 2?
Image by Flickr user: adurdin (cc)
VIRTUAL BASTION 