Rockstar Plays it Safe

Chris Morris at CNN's Game Over column has news of the cancellation of 'Snow', a planned title which would have placed the player in the role of a drug kingpin. From the article: "The reason is anybody's guess. 2K Games, the Take Two division that was publishing 'Snow,' confirmed the cancellation, but declined to give any sort of reason. It might have been because of the controversy the game was bound to kick up. It might have been because the game's developer, FrogCity Software (along with fellow studio PopTop Software) was recently folded into Firaxis, a Take Two-owned development studio run by industry legend Sid Meier. It may have simply been that the game wasn't turning out to be any fun."

Comments

I call bullshit

[gorbachev]

That CNN Money article doesn't mention why the game was cancelled. They're speculating it must've been because the game was "controversial". Given all the financial and quality problems Take Two is having at the moment it wouldn't surprise me at all if the real reason was financial and/or the game sucked so bad it got scrapped before more good money was thrown after bad money on a title that wasn't going to move off the shelves. Thumper Thompson is, of course, going to trumpet this as a resounding victory for the righteous, but I think the real reason has more to do with bean counting than backing down under pressure from blowhard hypocrites.