Runemaster - Development Frozen

After the good news about Dead State comes bad news about Paradox Development Studio's first RPG, Runemaster:

I have some news to share with you today regarding Runemaster. After much internal debate we have made the decision to freeze development of the project until further notice and move the development team working on it to other projects within Paradox Development Studio.

This was not an easy decision to make - Runemaster was a very ambitious project for us, and the team working on it brought all of their passion, dedication, and talent to the table. Despite our best efforts and a couple of re-scopes, Runemaster in its current form was unable to live up to the standards we set for ourselves here at Paradox.

Runemaster was a different type of game for us, and even though we were not able to fully realize our vision for it, we will take the lessons we learned to heart as we move forward with new endeavors. We will also look into how we can re-use the best parts of the game in other ways.

Our aim is to let all the talented developers who worked on the project to remain with Paradox Development Studio and bring their expertise to the other great games currently in development.

I hope Paradox finds a way to make this work in the future, but, in general, I am happier to see Paradox and PDS kill a project rather than release something below expectations.

More information.

Never heard about that game before.
As usual, I don't buy their excuses just as I didn't buy the same excuse for cancelling Torn ages ago when it was actually the first sign of Interplay sinking.

How dissapointing…

I wonder why they couldn't make it work? The concept felt so orginal and the setting of this game was truly one of it's kind. How often can one jump into Viking-age and experience those myths and legends… I was quite looking forward of this game and then just before xmas they pull the plug. I really thought that Paradox had a diamond in their hands, but looks like it was never meant to be.

Originally Posted by joxer
Never heard about that game before.
As usual, I don't buy their excuses just as I didn't buy the same excuse for cancelling Torn ages ago when it was actually the first sign of Interplay sinking.

I certainly don't get the sense that Paradox is sinking. If anything, I think their ability to cancel projects deep into development is a sign of their relative health. Just a few years ago, they were occasionally releasing games in abysmal shape. Recently, they've stepped up QA, and canceled a number of problematic projects (Magna Mundi, the Hearts of Iron Cold War game, this, and others I'm sure I'm unaware of).

It's unfortunate that this game is frozen, as I did like a lot of what they were saying about it, but I get the sense that Paradox and PDS, more generally, are healthier than they've been since their founding.

Shame. It looked like a fun game. Sort of like a better version of Warlock Master of the Arcane with Norse mythology and stronger rpg elements.

Not the first time Paradox has canceled a project (there was that EU 3 mod that was going to spin off to it's own game that Paradox pulled the plug on a couple years ago too). I doubt this stems from financial problems, I think they really just are willing to cancel projects that don't hit their standards these days.

Sad - this looked interesting.

I was curious to see what an RPG from Paradox would be like, given their history of complex strategy games.

Damn, I was expecting this game. This is very bad news for me

Really nice art direction, looked forward to this game.

I was looking forward to this game, but I was suspecting a problem… Their last 10 or so development diaries were all about describing their races and worlds, nothing about the actual game. It's a real shame, I saw the combat gameplay video from a while back and totally digged it.

I was excited about the game. Still, better to pull the plug than to release something you think is going to be "unable to live up to our standards."

Did not see that coming. Disappointing.

This cancellation bothers me quite a bit. I really thought this had the potential to be a really deep and engrossing title.