Announced way back in 2008, Beyond Good and Evil 2 now holds the dubious record for the longest development period for a videogame. Officially, the current Guinness world record holder is Duke Nukem Forever, but that will surely be updated soon.
It has been 5,234 days since the first Beyond Good & Evil 2 trailer was released. — Brendan Sinclair (@BrendanSinclair) September 28, 2022 According to a tweet from GamesIndustry.biz’s Brendan Sinclair, Duke Nukem Forever took 5,156 days to develop. The sequel for Beyond Good and Evil has already surpassed that with 5,234 days since the game was first announced during the Ubidays 2008. Michel Ancel, who directed the first Beyond Good and Evil, said in an interview in May 2008 that the game was already a year into its development but was yet to be approved by Ubisoft. It was later in Ubidays 2008 that the game trailer was first revealed. In 2009, a second trailer video was leaked online and Ancel confirmed that it was authentic. There was no news about the development until 2016 when Ancel some images for the game on social media. Ubisoft released a flashy new trailer for BG&E2 during E3 2017. The new game was announced as a prequel to the original. Ancel confirmed that the studio made a decision to change direction and make a prequel and the trailer shown in 2008 was essentially a different game. It was rumored that the prequel was to be released as an exclusive for the Nintendo Switch. Ancel denied the rumors and stated that the platform for the game was yet to be announced. Since its announcement at E3 2017, Ubisoft has given little information about the development of Beyond Good and Evil 2. Ancel left the company in 2020 and Ubisoft stated that he had not been directly involved in Beyond Good and Evil 2 for some time before his departure. There was some mention of the game during the Ubisoft 2021 financial report but the company did not field questions regarding the game. In 2022, Ubisoft listed BG&E2 as a game that is still in active development. Sarah Arellano, who previously worked as a Narrative Designer for Blizzard, will be joining as Lead Writer for Beyond Good and Evil 2. Arellano previously worked on the Saint’s Row reboot. As to when we will Beyond Good and Evil 2, that is still a major question mark. Ubisoft has stated that the development is “progressing well” but that is as much as we will be getting for the time being. Fans of the original game will have to wait a little longer to see a finished product. It would be safe to assume that we can add about an extra year into the development period for the game. We hope, for Ubisoft’s sake, that Beyond Good and Evil 2 will be worth all that time and effort. The Game Awards is two months away and perhaps we will get more updates by then.
