Celeste Developer Cancels New Game Earthblade

The game development studio, Extremely OK Games, renowned for creating the indie hit Celeste, has regrettably cancelled their upcoming title, Earthblade. This decision follows a dispute over intellectual property rights related to Celeste that occurred within the team, which was never fully resolved despite negotiations. Maddy Thorson and Noel Berry, key figures in the project, ultimately decided that continuing with Earthblade was not the best choice. The final call was made last month.

On our website’s blog post recently, the following scenario was shared: This year, a rift started developing within our team. It mainly involved Noel, myself, and Pedro, an original EXOK member, close associate, and art director for Earthblade as well as pixel/UI artist on Celeste and TowerFall. The dispute revolved around the ownership of the Celeste intellectual property, which we’ve decided not to discuss openly – needless to say, it was a challenging and painful experience for all involved.

The team admitted that although the project had promising aspects, it was not as far along in development as expected, given the elapsed time. Noel and I also acknowledged that working on this project daily has been challenging for quite some time. As we looked back, we felt that the struggle wasn’t just due to the length of the project but seemed to run deeper. The developer found the project overwhelming, largely because of the high expectations associated with Celeste.

Regarding future endeavors from Extremely Ok Games, the team is shifting their attention towards smaller-sized projects. At present, they are busy with prototyping and exploring at their own pace, aiming to rekindle their approach to game development similar to that during the early stages of Celeste or TowerFall. For additional details, check out the blog post via the provided link.

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2025-01-23 03:36