VIDEO LucasArts Canceled a Darth Maul Game

The characters of KOTOR weren't in "any" movies & it's arguably the greatest Star Wars game.

 

Darth Vader is in games & it's years since he was in a movie. Maul is very popular & recognisable like Vader, and he has unique selling points like the double lightsabre

 

Are we sure it's fully cancelled? Maybe half of it is still in development.

 

I really don't buy a lot of the specifics of the article. Red Fly claims they pitched the game in early 2010... problem with that. They would have been immediately stopped due to development of Maul for Clone Wars, The Maul arc aired in the 2011-2012 season, but the show's production cycle was running a full 2-3 years ahead of schedule. The Maul episodes would have been deep in development and most likely actors would have already recorded. So Red Fly's pitch is a non starter to begin with.

Given how little Lucas cared for the EU and some of the outright disdain he had for it, I have a hard time believing he would be taking with game designers about a Darth Maul and Darth Talon buddy game. What probably really happened is Red Fly was told there was already a Maul story under development, but if they were willing to work under certain restrictions they could go ahead. Also given how little actual direct involvement with LucasArts Lucas actually had with the exception of multimedia event games like Shadows or Force Unleashed I highly question whether Red Fly met with Lucas for this particular project. Most likely they probably met with LucasArts execs who were throwing out ideas based on some loose notes from Lucas.

But writing a story like this generates more web hits for Game Informer, and certainly makes Red Fly look like some unfortunate victim, and probably gets some attention for the company.

 

Nope, not even a little. If you get a chance, check out the article in GI. literally makes Lucas seem insane. They plainly name Darth Talon as the "buddy cop" idea and Savage Opress is only mentioned in passing as Darth Maul's brother who, at the time, the studio was told "was green". So, obvioulsy early concepts all around. The article basically describes the team at Red Fly's experience as awful. They made the port of TFU II for Wii in a few months from scratch and when LA got an itch for a Maul game they went to Red Fly. Basically they were creating assets and models for a game that had no story due to LFL not wanting to "spoil" any BS for the Clone Wars revival of Maul. The original vision for the game in Red Fly's hands was a two part game focusing on Maul's capture and upbringing as a Sith by Palpatine, his dealings with training and onto missions with the Black Sun and everything else then cap off at the end of TPM with his death. After a few meetings they learned "hey Maul didn't die at the end of episode 1 so yeah he's alive and you're gonna do that." so they saw their idea begin to be pushed aside and they moved into doing a post TPM game with Maul having robo legs. Basically fast forward awhile and they have a sit down with Lucas and in the room is a Darth Talon statue and a Darth Maul statue. In the middle of Red Hook's pitch for a game, Lucas gets up and says "these two are friends. I want them to be partners." Apparently someone mentioned how it would be difficult due to the fact they are from different eras, with nearly 170 years separating them. Lucas didn't seem to care and said "then they're related, or she is his clone. We can work that out." Utter nonsense. also it's mentioned that before the meeting the developer is told "never say no to Lucas and don't mention the main character from TFU and also, don't tell him how the force works." Just sounds like Lucas is an utter nut job surrounded by yes men.

all that crap aside, the footage looks cool enough and I think given time the game would've been really cool. sucks it was shelved.

I doubt it. That doesn't make a whole hell of a lot of sense. Given LA's work history it sounds like what Red Fly said was pretty accurate. Look at the past experiences with TFU II on Wii. Did they make that up for publicity? I doubt it, since hardly anyone has heard of the game studio.

I don't doubt for a single second that LA had them making a game and assets for a game while also keeping everything about the CW return of Maul on the low. Sure LFL knew about it and so did LA but that doesn't mean they would tell a game company, who in the article said they were on a month-by-month contract with LA. The intention was likely to get a game rolling and when Darth Maul returned to the CW tell them "this will be your focus". But that obviously didn't happen. As you can tell. Also, why wouldn't Lucas meet with them? Because he only made time for big events like Shadows and TFU? What makes you think this wouldn't have been a huge game had it been released with a fully loaded hype train? Maul is one of the sagas most recognizable characters and a game surrounding him would surely be a huge deal. I don't doub they met with Lucas at all.

I don't doubt the credibility of the story at all. Give that LA has been a mess for years on end, this sort of article doesn't surprise me and only lends evidence to the fact that (as mentioned before) LA was in the toilet before Disney even took over. I don't think a couple hot clicks would get GI to fabricate an entire story, nor would it do Red Fly any favors. STILL, no one really knows who they are. It's not like they're churning out GOTY titles now since this story broke. And it plainly states Lucas Arts paid them well and made sure their doors remained open. It wasn't a big sob story or a poo-poo. Just an inside look at how horribly Star Wars games are developed and given the sheer lack of Star Wars games we have on a yearly basis, I absolutely believe it.

 

or its sounds like lucas knows what what he wants.

 

Does it? It sounds to me like Lucas is kind of daft in his old age. We all kind of suspected as much throughout the prequels, but in reading the article he sounds like the kind of guy who, sure, "knows what he wants" even if what he wants isn't feasible or even best for business. The story that the studio had in place beforehand, which was that of Maul shown being raised and trained etc. sound much better than a buddy co-op game with two characters from opposing ends of the GFFA. It would be like teaming up Exar Kun and Darth Vader.

 

It just continues to blow my mind how mismanaged LucasArts was within the Lucasfilm structure. We sort of already knew that these past few years, but everything that's come to light since their closure just raises the level of mismanagement to epic proportions. It's not entirely all of LucasArts' fault, either, a good portion of the blame lies on the parent company, and even Lucas himself. We're talking about extreme incompetency, divisiveness, poor work ethics, miscommunication, and clear lack of goals and objectives, both artistically and financially. You figure someone would have taken a stand to right things (perhaps partly why LucasArts went through so many leadership changes during its final years...?).

The comments of Lucas and his behavior don't really surprise me at all; the team behind 1313 had to deal with the same mess as well. True credit has to be given for Lucas as a filmmaker, businessman, artist, and philanthropist, but that doesn't mean he is flawless. Yes, he created the Star Wars universe; he's the "auteur" of it, but Star Wars has become much more than just a series of films--it's a vast multimedia property that brings in $$$$ on a global scale. Just because Lucas is the creator, doesn't mean he always knows what's best for the property, as evident from certain aspects of TCW, as well as his suggestions, nay, demands, for certain aspects of LucasArts games.


I feel bad for RedFly; what a terrible experience.

 

Looks like a statue behind him on board a Star Destroyer or Imperial station of some sort , before he walks in the hanger to what appears to be him reclaiming his old ship.

 

This game looked fantastic. :/ Too many cancelled Star Wars games with resources and development files sat in dusty offices. </3

 

I guess there's some kind of hope that Disney could breathe life into this game, or something like it. I mean, a Darth Maul game like this, or even like Shadows of Mordor (or a game in that wheelhouse) would've been a huge hit.

 

Given they abandoning the completely terrible prequels at every turn, I doubt they will resurrect this game.

 

i ignore your content.

 

This game looked great.

 

Hope to God it happens, hope Lucasfilm/EA makes the right call and this game goes not go out like 1313 or Battlefront 3:

http://www.hardcoregamer.com/2015/1...o-resurrect-cancelled-darth-maul-game/173853/

 

https://www.reddit.com/r/IAmA/comments/3q2mpm/hi_im_dan_borth_of_red_fly_studio_the_creators_of/
Apparently they wanted the game to be a Maul origin story, and the game would've ended with a final boss fight against Darth Sidious.
I need this game now !

 

Seriously want this to get made! Would be a great way to canonize more of Maul's backstory.

 

Seems pretty ambitious and passionate but realistically its probably gonna be a slim chance .Appears they had a lot more stuff than what was shown in the released demo last year we all saw. Some interesting tidbits:

Spoiler

Appears they'd pitch/stick with a Maul origin story if left up to them alone and return it to their original idea before Lucas got more involved and the storyline was moved away from an origin strictly tale to TCW and Legacy eras. Looks like that guy wanted to insert Siolo'urmanka and something mimicking that Tales comic.

 

I guess you haven't heard about the new Ani and Obi comic coming out in January, Ender Sai.

 

Ender Sai's the biggest troll there is. just press ignore.

 

http://www.nintendolife.com/news/20..._cancelled_nintendo_exclusive_darth_maul_game

It might be returning! Yes! I hope EA is generous enough to release it despite the fact it's be in the prequel era.

 

Probably Witwer will voice Maul if it happens, he's got first dibs on voicing Maul in the media since his TCW hiring.

 

This game sounds like it would have been awesome, it would have been great to have had the darker elements of SW to be explored. The amount of Sith included in the game sounds epic, I really hope this game ends up getting released, hopefully it will be released on all consoles though.

 

Please be fake. If not, somebody has a lot of explaining why this was cancelled....

 

Heh, but yeah thats a real demo from Red Fly.