Skip to main content

After eight years, 'Beyond Good & Evil 2' is still mired in pre-production

beyond good and evil 2 technical problems beyondgoodevilhd
Image used with permission by copyright holder
The long-awaited sequel to the cult hit Beyond Good & Evil is indeed on the way, but don’t start clearing your schedule quite yet — the game isn’t even close to launching.

Posting on Instagram, Michel Ancel, longtime Ubisoft Montpellier creative director, revealed new character art from the sequel — a rhino with long dreadlocks and a military cap — with the image’s caption listing the game as “in pre-production.”

Endangered species – now saved – Game in pre-production – Stay tuned !

A photo posted by Michel Ancel (@michelancel) on

The character appears to be one of the Mammago brothers from the original game, though his cap has gotten considerably smaller and his clothing a bit more militaristic. This follows two other images uploaded by Ancel on the same account, first of a pig creature on the shoulders of a mechanic, and, later, of a bipedal shark.

If you haven’t yet played the original game, you have a couple of options for doing so without spending any cash. In August, a backward compatible version of Beyond Good & Evil was released through Xbox Live’s “Games With Gold” program to Xbox One and Xbox 360 owners. The PC version will also be the next free game released for Ubisoft’s 30th anniversary celebration, starting on October 12. Another one of Ancel’s creations, Rayman Origins, was made available for free earlier in the summer.

A Beyond Good & Evil sequel was originally announced by Ubisoft more than eight years ago with a beautiful teaser trailer, but virtually no information has been released in the ensuing years. Since then, Ancel has continued to direct other projects at Ubisoft Montpellier, including Rayman Origins and Rayman Legends. His time is now split between Ubisoft and his independent Wild Sheep Studio. The team’s first project is the ambitious PlayStation 4 exclusive Wild, which Ancel claims features a game world the size of Europe and the ability to play as everything from a wolf to a trout.

Editors' Recommendations

Gabe Gurwin
Former Digital Trends Contributor
Gabe Gurwin has been playing games since 1997, beginning with the N64 and the Super Nintendo. He began his journalism career…
Indiana Jones and the Great Circle: release date window, trailers, gameplay, and more
Indiana Jones standing in the jungle.

Grab your fedora, whip, and pistol because Indiana Jones and the Great Circle is plotting a course to consoles soon. After being announced via a small teaser in 2021, we're now finally starting to put the pieces together on the mystery that is this new title from MachineGames. While many very popular and successful games have been inspired by the Indiana Jones film franchise, including Uncharted and Tomb Raider, Indy himself has yet to star in a true action-adventure game worthy of his legacy. Will this game be the one to remind audiences who the true pioneer of set-piece action and globe-trotting puzzle-solving is? Only time will tell, but we can at least guess based on all the clues we've unearthed.
Release date window
Indiana Jones and the Great Circle will be released is scheduled for release sometime in 2024. Considering the slate of titles currently announced from first-party publishers, and how little we've seen of this game in comparison, we'd expect it to arrive in the last few months of the year. Of course, it could always slip into next year as well.
Platforms

Indiana Jones and the Great Circle, coming from Xbox-owned MachineGames, will be an Xbox console exclusive, but also be available on PC.
Trailers
Official Gameplay Reveal Trailer: Indiana Jones and the Great Circle

Read more
How to get to Monkey Island in Sea of Thieves
An election poster for guybrush in Sea of Thieves.

Over the course of its many years of updates and expansions, Sea of Thieves has had a few notable crossovers with other pirate franchises. The Pirates of the Caribbean crossover let you team up with the legendary Jack Sparrow, but the Monkey Island content felt like it came out of nowhere. For those unaware, Monkey Island is a series of pirate point-and-click games that were as funny as the puzzles were obscure. Thankfully, you don't have to intuit that you need to combine a cat whisker with a mason jar to bypass a skeleton guard to get to this new content, but it is more challenging than you might think.

Read more
3 Xbox Game Pass games you need to play this weekend (May 3-5)
Senua in Hellblade: Senua's Sacrifice.

Another weekend is upon us, and you're probably looking for some games to kill time with over the course of it. We're in a bit of a lull right now ahead of a flurry of releases starting next week, so it's a great time to dip back into the Xbox Game Pass catalog and check out some games that you may have missed. There are three games in particular that I think you should check out this weekend if you're looking for something to play.

One is an unsettling adventure that's getting an Xbox-exclusive sequel later this month. The next is a finely animated roguelike indie that recently made its way to Microsoft's gaming subscription service. Finally, there's a relaxing adventure that gives players a lot of freedom, yet is short enough to beat in a weekend. If you're having trouble deciding what to play this weekend, give one of these games a shot.
Hellblade: Senua's Sacrifice

Read more