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Outcast 2: The Lost Paradise is a canceled action-adventure game that was developed from 1999 to 2001 by Appeal Studios and published by Infogrames for the PC and the Playstation 2. It was the sequel to the game Outcast, released in 1999 exclusively on PC and also developed by Appeal.

Franck Sauer, co-founder of Appeal, shared the full experience of the development of Outcast 2 on his personal website:

HOW IT ALL STARTED
PRE-PRODUCTION
In mid-1999, right after the release of Outcast, we started pitching new ideas about a sequel and tried to convince Infogrames (our publisher) to fund a pre-production, quickly.
Infogrames had stock in our studio Appeal, and as partners they were more inclined to help us proceed with the sequel. They were cautious though. The sales reports from Outcast were underwhelming, way below their one million initial target (we ended up selling slightly over 400k boxed units).
At first we managed to sign a pre-production deal and we proceed with R&D and graphics design. As sales were disapointing on the PC, Infogrames insisted that we should make the game for consoles first. They also insisted to have more action and less adventure, because that’s what console gamers want they said, something Yves Grolet in particular was not very happy with.
FROM PC TO PLAYSTATION 2
Another difficulty started when it became evident the Playstation 2 would be the best selling console of the generation. Yves wanted to work on the Xbox, which was the superior console in term of rendering capabilities, and easier to work with, but from the publisher’s point of view it made no sense to work for the smaller installed base. We all liked the idea of working on consoles in general, as close systems have their sets of challenges but are very interesting to work on, and we had this arcade background that made us probably overconfident, especially considering the Playstation 2.
The Playstation 2 was a very difficult console to work with, especially for a studio with most of its engineers only experienced on PC, and it took some times to get the dev kits and actually realise what a PS2 was (there was a lot of speculation at the time). With the dev kits finally available, we were progressing slowly and initially had a lot of performances and stability issues. At some point, Yves would decide to quit and start his own company (elseWhere Entertainment) to work on the Xbox.
We finally signed a production agreement. At first it was a 7 million contract, but got reduced to 5 million as Infogrames was starting to feel pressure from the market. We managed to develop a working demo with a lot more work also done behind the scene on the game’s universe and environments, but we were far from being ready to ship an actual product. Internal difficulties also raised when we hired a designer to replace Yves, only to find out a bit late that the guy was heading the design in the wrong direction. That didn’t help either as we had to rethink the whole design again in the middle of the production.
The project was killed after spending about 3 millions as Infogrames stocks were hitting a new low in 2001 after the internet bubble (and all IT companies as a side effects) exploded. They pretty much killed all their 3rd party projects, focussing all remaining funds to their internal studio, Eden Games.
THE START OF THE END
However, as Infogrames were shareholders in our company, they couldn’t kill us so easily (they would have to clear-up the debts). Instead they sold us back their stocks in exchange of a new pre-production contract around a Tintin game. We didn’t have much choice if we wanted to keep the studio alive, but for them it was a win-win situation, they were set free from their shareholder duties and had a working prototype they could show to Moulinsart (the company that holds the rights to Tintin).
When the Tintin prototype was completed, they did not sign the Tintin game (purposely or not we have no idea) and we went bankrupt in 2002. Yann Robert and I purchased back most of the assets belonging to Appeal the Curator could not sell, including the unfinished technology that would help us later to develop and (finally) ship Playstation 2 games Wild Water Adrenaline and Mountain Bike Adrenaline.

Some additional details were shared in February 2015 by Gamestar during an interview with Frank Sauer. We learned in particular that the game was running on a brand new engine called Himalaya, replacing the voxel technology, used on the first title, in favor of one working with polygons. For instance, it allowed to display swirling dust particles in some levels.

Still according to Franck Sauer, the story took place just after the events of the first Outcast, where the main character, Cutter Slade, now living alone in a hut in the mountains, receives a distress call from a Talan, the natives from the planet Adelpha, about an invasion of humans, called New World Army and helped by soldier bots, coming to colonize the planet. A parallel with the film Avatar was notably drawn. Other novelties planned in the sequel were the addition of an all-terrain vehicle for travelling in the open world as well as new levels and territories, such as, for example, a spaceship that Cutter had to hijack in order to be able to move from one area to another.

After more than a decade without the license being mentioned, Appeal, under the name DAOKA Studio at the time, attempted a first comeback for a reboot of the first game in high definition called Outcast Reboot HD in 2014 on Kickstarter, unfortunately without success. Later that same year, the developers, under the Fresh3D’s name, ported the original game to Steam as Outcast 1.1, before managing to release their HD remake in 2017 under the name Outcast: Second Contact on PC, Xbox One and Playstation 4 thanks to BigBen Interactive as publisher. At the beginning of 2019, the publisher THQ Nordic bought the license before officially announcing a sequel on September 17 2021, still developed by the original team, renamed once again Appeal Studios, and called Outcast 2: A New Beginning, almost 20 years after the cancellation of the original planned sequel.

Article updated by Daniel Nicaise

Thanks to Marcel Lutrix for the contribution!

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Microsoft, PC / MAC, Playstation 2 (PS2), Sony, Xbox

City of the Dead (Kuju Entertainment) [PC, Xbox, PS2 – Cancelled]

U64 Staff & Contributors

11-12-2022

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City of the Dead, also known as The Living Dead : City of the Dead and George A. Romero’s City of the Dead, is a canceled horror first-person shooter developed by Kuju Entertainment and published by Hip Interactive for PC, Xbox and Playsation 2 platforms in 2005.

Presented as “the goriest game ever made”, City of the Dead was first revealed in August 2004 by none other than American McGee as his next game, wanting to sign a deal with Living Dead Productions, the company of the father of the Zombie film, George A. Romero:

“Recently, my company TMIEC partnered with Asylum Entertainment to bring to life a new Romero concept called “City of the Dead”. We’re now in the process of shopping the interactive rights to games publishers. The tagline for the product is “the goriest game ever made”.

Only a few days after that, American McGee announced that it could finally be MercurySteam Entertainment instead of Asylum developing City of the Dead:

“The guys at MercurySteam sent over a couple of cool zombie concept images. Based on what an amazing job they’ve done on Scrapland we’re really excited to have them attached to develop the Romero “City of the Dead” game.”

In December of the same year, Hip Interactive revealed to have signed a deal with Living Dead Productions about a game named City of the Dead, without saying if it was the same concept initially pitched by American McGee, or a brand new one as some media would later said that it was a different game:

“Horror fans have been searching for the ultimate experience in gaming, and we intend to deliver it to them with the tremendous creative input of legendary director, George A. Romero, and Living Dead Productions,” said Arindra Singh, President and CEO of Hip Interactive.
“This is a fantastic opportunity to share George’s work and ideas with the game buying public,” said Simon Bailey, Managing Director of Living Dead Productions. “We are very impressed with the quality of work that Hip will bring to the games. George’s fans and gamers alike will not be disappointed!”

Shortly after this announcement, media revealed that it was ultimately Kuju Entertainment that would develop it, replacing MercurySteam, which was slated for release in March 2006:

“Back in December, Hip Interactive announced it will produce games based on the work of horror director George A. Romero, creator of classic zombie-fests like Night of the Living Dead and Dawn of the Dead.
Hip Interactive has recruited developer Kuju Entertainment to produce the first of the Romero games, which is expected to appear by March of 2006.”

The game was officially announced shortly before E3 2005 in a statement from Hip Interactive:

“City of the Dead” begins as four desperate survivors escape a ravaged zombie infested city by helicopter. After making it to the remote island of Isla Mortal (N.B. : some media wrote that the name of the setting was Island of Ningun Futuro instead), an accident destroys their only means of escape. Unbeknown to them the island is home to a top secret military installation, overrun by the walking dead. Armed with an arsenal of traditional and futuristic weaponry, players must battle the living dead from dusk ’till dawn in series of abandoned locales. With split-screen co-op missions, party mode, and four-player online feature, “City of the Dead” also promises a range of multiplayer features that allow gamers to play as human or zombie.”

We also learned that Tom Savini lent his voice to one of the main characters:

“The company also revealed today that Tom Savini, star of From Dusk till Dawn and known horror makeup artist, will lend his voice and likeness to City of the Dead. Savini will play William “Red” McLean, a battle-worn ex-cop who initially lends support to the player, but will eventually be a playable character himself.”

Presented at E3 2005, the game received various previews from IGN, Gamespy and Gamespot. Thus, IGN wrote:

“Hip Games’ City of the Dead is a first-person shooter that’s “Trying to become Burnout for the shooting genre.” That’s at least according to company representatives, anyway. Judging by the short presentation we saw, it seems that City of the Dead can more accurately be described as, “a totally vicious FPS that features buckets of blood interspersed with the occasional cubic ton of tenderized brain matter.” City of the Dead does still feature some cool Burnout-like gameplay elements, though.
One of the modes within City of the Dead mimics Burnout 3’s infamous Crash Mode and tasks players with killing as many zombies as possible with a single shot from a specific weapon. To do this, players will want to wait for the most opportune moment to fire their weapon at one of a number of preset environmental hazards, be they massive crates suspended from cranes or conveniently placed combustible barrels. Once you shoot, the widely used Havok physics systems will take care of the rest. This way the results of the action are always different.
In terms of an actual story mode, City of the Dead features one city, some animated dead people who are terribly reluctant to stop moving, and a few dudes who’d really like to not become one of them.
In a way, City of the Dead sort of resembles a cross between Resident Evil and Soldier of Fortune. That is, the game features an excessive amount of dismemberment and gore, which it is not at all afraid to highlight with a number of cinematic, slow-mo camera swoops, zooms and pans. But unlike Soldier of Fortune, the enemies just keep on coming.
Before we go, check out this cool thing we noticed that most people might overlook… When you shoot an enemy, he is entirely governed by physics, meaning he’ll flop around like any good rag doll should. But, totally unlike just about every other game under the sun, enemies in City of the Dead can actually get up and begin animating after the physics routine has initiated and played out. This is, as far as we know, a technical problem no other developer has yet been able to resolve well (at least we haven’t seen it implemented in any other game).”

Gamespot, for its part, told us:

“City of the Dead isn’t based on any specific Romero films, but it is based within the larger Dead universe. In it, you play as one of five different characters, all of which are just trying to survive in a city that has been overrun with the walking dead.
The game itself is a first-person shooter, and it really doesn’t aspire to be anything more than a fast-paced arcade shooter. You’ll find a number of different weapon types, including pistols, machine guns, grenades, and shotguns. There were a couple of unique aspects of the weapons we saw. For instance, the shotgun is fully pump-action, meaning each time you fire, you’ll have to manually reload it using the left trigger button. While that might seem a little cumbersome at first, it actually wasn’t, and it seemed to add to the intensity of the action. Another cool thing is the way you can kind of jury-rig other things onto your weapons to make them more effective in melee combat. For example, you can tie a shovel to the butt of the shotgun, making it much easier to explode a zombie’s head. The same can be done to your pistols, by taping brass knuckles to them.
Zombies tend to travel in groups, and they come in different varieties. Obviously, there’s the usual lumbering, biting, angry zombie, but we also saw a cop zombie, who continually fired a shotgun at us at random intervals and a leaper zombie, a creepy little guy who crawls around on the ground and then jumps at you. Zombies cannot be killed unless you destroy the brain, but you can knock them backward or even blow off body parts if you hit them elsewhere.
There will be 14 to 16 story missions in the game, though the story here is barely the focus. The developers used Burnout as an example of how they are really looking to make a super-arcadey, over-the-top kind of game. So a lot of the mission objectives will be appropriately focused on killing as many zombies as you can, without much worry about anything else. Once you complete the story mode, you’ll also have arcade and multiplayer modes to check out. The arcade mode works similarly to Soul Calibur’s weapon master mode. You’ll be given a series of available challenges, each with semi-arbitrary rules, like you can only use melee combat, or you have to kill a certain number of a specific type of zombie. The multiplayer will be online for up to four players and features competitive and cooperative play. The cooperative mode sounds especially cool, as during the mode, your friends can be infected. Here, you can opt to just kill your partner immediately, sparing him the change of death, or you can keep him alive long enough to help you kill some more zombies. You’ll have to be careful, however, because once they turn, they’ll come after you.”

Finally, the Gamespy preview said:

“The game’s big visual attraction is the physics engine which flings zombies realistically around based on point of impact. Naturally, this means that there will be a variety of classic weapons such as pistols, shotguns and rocket launchers to turn the zombies into so much zombie goulash. Since it takes a headshot to kill these things, the game also rewards good shots with a beautiful images of exploding heads using a slow motion “bullet-time” effect. Given how tough the zombies are, though, it’ll take more than just a steady hand to take them out, though. That’s why the environment is full of exploding things such as gas canisters, fuel drums and crates of explosives that can set off awesome chain reactions. Judicious use of these items will be vital in clearing out levels in story mode.
As much fun as story mode looks, though, it doesn’t really hold a candle to the “One-shot” levels. These are bonus levels that are unlocked as the player goes through story mode. Undoubtedly inspired by Burnout 3’s crash challenges, the “One-shot” levels puts you in an enclosed space with a bunch of zombies wandering around and a gun with only one bullet. The challenge is to pick out the correct exploding device to shoot to set off a chain reaction that will kill as many zombies as possible in as entertaining a manner as possible.
City of the Dead will sport a multiplayer mode, but rather than just offer up a vanilla deathmatch capability, the game will instead sport a four-player co-op mode that works off the strengths of the setting. If a player gets bitten once during the game (as opposed to shot or hit), that’s it, a countdown timer starts, the player dies, and turns into a zombie. That means that even though four players start the game together, eventually someone’s going to end up a zombie — and that’s where the real fun starts. Players who become zombies will respawn as new zombies when they die and start hunting those who are still alive. They get all the strengths and weakness of the undead (slow speed and incredible resilience), so the game for the zombies becomes using their brains to set up ambushes for the human players.”

Unfortunately, only 2 months after City of the Dead was revealed, Hip Interactive filed for bankruptcy:

“After failing to strike a last-minute deal to bolster its shaky finances, Hip Interactive said it has ceased operations and would close its doors completely in short order. The company said this morning that “discussions with a third party to provide interim relief in respect of the Company’s immediate financing needs were not successful.”
“The publisher had a number of high-profile games on its upcoming slate including Call of Cthulhu: Destiny’s End, George Romero’s City of the Dead, and Jackie Chan Adventures. There has been no word on which publishers are in line to pick up those and other games due from Hip.”

Only a month after the publisher’s demise, Kuju Entertainment was trying to find a new one for the game, but alas, no deal will materialize and City of the Dead vanished after this news. It was once suggested that Freeze Interactive, a Franco-Swiss publisher founded by former staffs of the European branch of Hip Interactive, had taken over the game, now titled World of the Dead, but nothing was officially confirmed, and World of the Dead disappeared very quickly without any information, just like Freeze Interactive. This rumor followed the fact that Ghost Wars, another game initially canceled with the closure of Hip Interactive, was taken over by Freeze shortly after.

Article by Daniel Nicaise

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Microsoft, Playstation 3 (PS3), Sony, Xbox 360

Cipher Complex [X360/PS3 – Cancelled]

monokoma

09-12-2022

2 Comments

Cipher Complex is a canceled stealth/action game for Xbox 360 and Playstation 3, alongside a potential PC version, developed by Edge of Reality and published by Sega, from 2005 to 2009. The game was officially revealed in June 2006 by it’s developer where the plot emerged:

“Cipher Complex is an intense, cinematic military combat game that will deliver a brutal shot of adrenaline straight to the hearts of next-generation gamers.
U.S. surveillance satellites detect activity onboard the decommissioned Soviet Bargration Missile Defense Station 4 off the east coast of Siberia. When the Russians deny the U.S. access to the facility, Department of Defense strategists suggest that a small, plausibly deniable reconnaissance mission be sent in to investigate. The Defense Threat Reduction Agency is given the go-ahead for operation BLACKOUT, the insertion of a single expert Operator on Russian WMDs and launch facilities. Lt. Col. John Sullivan, callsign: Cipher is air dropped in, and what was supposed to be primarily a reconnaisance mission becomes a race against a terrorist threat; one with implications that will shake the foundations of American democracy and freedoms.”

After it’s revelation, however, little was shown in the press except that in 2008, a deal was signed with “an important publisher“. Unfortunately, in January 2009, as Gamespot pointed out, it appeared that the publisher was Sega, but that they also took the decision to cancel the game without statements:

“As spotted by the increasingly prolific Superannuation, the LinkedIn profile of a former Edge of Reality producer indicates that Sega pulled the plug on the Xbox 360 and PlayStation 3 game earlier this year. “Producer for Cipher Complex that was canceled by Sega,” reads the job description of Rob Brown, who served on the project from July 2008 to January 2009.
Oddly, if Cipher Complex has been canceled, Sega and Edge of Reality have made no outward signs of saying so. The game’s Web site remains wholly intact, if devoid of content, and the developer’s Web site continues to promote the project.”

It is still unclear what caused it’s cancellation, even if some people speculated that the 2008 economic crisis was the main reason.

In June 2010, a 10 minutes gameplay video was leaked onto the internet, showing the main character carries out various actions with speed, precision, strength and cunning stealth to neutralize enemies. Under that same video, in the commentaries section, Voice-Over talent Anthony Mendez answered back in 2016 to someone:

“I did the voiceover for the main character. This was simply a vertical slice to demonstrate the approach and some of the characters, etc. (…) With that said, the approach to stealth was ahead of its time – Arkham Knight uses this (albeit much more developed) but I’m sure if they had the opportunity, they would have finished a nice game.”

After it’s cancellation, Edge of Reality managed to make their own self-published new IP in 2014 with Free-To-Play multiplayer third-person shooter Loadout, which was sadly discarded around 2017, before definitely shutting down in 2018, the same year during Edge of Reality closed down their offices. Still in 2018, a prototype from March 2009 leaked onto the internet before being made publicly available for download in May 2020.

Article updated by Daniel Nicaise

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PC / MAC, Playstation 3 (PS3), Xbox 360

Sam Suede: Undercover Exposure (iBase Entertainment) [PC, XBOX 360?, PS3? – Cancelled]

Todd_the_Toad

08-12-2022

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Sam Suede: Undercover Exposure is an another project from Al Lowe, the author of Leisure Suit Larry series. It has been in development in his own studio, iBase Entertainment for PC and, probably, for consoles (XBOX 360 and PS3). The genre was “Action Comedy“.

By this definition, Lowe meant that now the characters would have to be incapacitated not with the help of weapons, but in a much more original way – in other words, to make them laugh to death. Not without branded puzzles and several mini-games. The role of the protagonist was played by Sam Suede, a charming loser who unexpectedly witnessed a crime and decided to independently take up the investigation (he had long dreamed of becoming a detective).

From gamesradar.com:

Sam starts off as something of a wannabe, uncertain of himself and short on skills. Suspects will be interviewed, clues pieced together and jokes pitched left and right – five minutes into the demo, he was wearing lipstick and a French maid’s costume and getting hit on by a security guard whose glasses were clearly waaay too dark.
Over the course of the game, Sam will score “encounters” with a variety of beautiful women, each time rising the following morning with a new bounce in his step, and more effective methods in his repertoire. Details on this score are scarce at the moment, but the stated emphasis on character interaction and dialogue over static cutscenes when interviewing suspects gives some idea of the machinations that’ll be at your disposal.

The style of the game was reminiscent of “Larry”, except that the trademark humor became more correct. However, the reason for the game’s cancellation was a lack of funding, due to the high cost of developing games for consoles – “Sam” was to be released on next-gen consoles as well (because, according to the game’s publisher, a PC-only release would not have paid for itself). According to Lowe’s, they had another year of work left to complete Suede Sam. The company’s website reports that as of January 2007, the game has been delayed until additional funding can be found. Unable to locate a publisher to promote and distribute Sam Suede, iBase Entertainment shut down in December 2006. Following this setback, Lowe expressed serious doubts whether he’d ever reenter the gaming industry again.

Some information is taken from «Игромания» magazine, 03 (114) 2007

PC / MAC, Playstation 3 (PS3), Xbox 360

Parabellum (Acony Games) [PC, PS3, Xbox 360 – Cancelled]

Daniel Nicaise

03-12-2022

1 Comment

Parabellum is a cancelled Free to Play multiplayer First-Person Shooter developed from 2005 to 2010 by Acony Games and published by K2 Network, for the PC alongside, for a while, potential Xbox 360 and Playstation 3 versions. Set in 2018, the game was about two factions, terrorist organization named “The Syndicate” and the counterterrorist forces (The CTF), fighting on maps based on districts from New York City. The project was first showed at the Games Convention 2006, where Gamespot was able to see it in action:

For starters, the city that the Delta Force is attempting to save in Parabellum comprises 12 distinct maps arranged on a grid with industrial, commercial, and residential themes. At the start of each timed campaign game, the terrorist players will get to choose which map they want to plant the bomb in, and then it’s up to the Delta Force to find it. The time limit that you choose for the game should determine how many of the city’s maps are in play, though this won’t necessarily happen automatically. After a campaign gets underway, the Delta Force players will need to defeat the terrorists on the current map before getting to choose which adjacent map to fight them on next, as they continue their search for the bomb. If the terrorists win a map, the same one will be played again–eating away at the Delta Force’s time limit.
When the Delta Force team chooses a new map, they’ll find that each one can be played from four different starting points (or in four different directions, if you prefer), so although there will only ever be 12 maps that need to be searched, there are 48 different gameplay experiences available. If the terrorist players correctly guess which map the Delta Force will choose to move into after winning a game, they’ll have an opportunity to spawn early and set up an ambush for the good guys.
The first map that we got to see the Delta Force scouring was from the city’s industrial zone and incorporated a building site and what appeared to be a factory of some description. When bullets started flying around the rain-soaked level, we noticed that practically every object in the nicely detailed environment appeared to be destructible to some degree, including a water tower high above the ground that leaked out of bullet holes when it was shot.
The destructibility of the maps will have a noticeable impact on gameplay in Parabellum, not only because you’ll be able to destroy items that could provide cover, but also because one of the three different ammo types available to you is capable of shooting clean through up to 20 meters of wall. To show us how this might be useful, the Acony representative who was demoing the game fired off a few rounds at a wall that he suspected an enemy might be hiding behind. It might also have been possible to take out the enemy by shooting from around a corner, since Parabellum supports ricocheting bullets, but it seemed like most of the projectiles ended up splashing harmlessly into puddles when this feature was demonstrated.
After watching a couple of fast-paced battles on the industrial map, we had an opportunity to check out a very different one set inside a large subway station–complete with deadly moving trains. After exploring the map for a while and showing off its impressive level of detail, the Acony player found the nuclear bomb and disarmed it.
Parabellum currently supports up to 32 players simultaneously, but the maps have apparently all been designed with six-on-six battles in mind at this point. Based on the two maps that we saw, we’d say that slightly larger groups of players shouldn’t pose any problems, but a full roster of 32 would almost certainly make the game feel a bit overcrowded.
One of Parabellum’s features that we didn’t get to see in action is the weapon-selection screen, which we understand you’ll use to customize your arsenal before each round. In addition to ammo, range, and rate-of-fire considerations, you’ll need to bear in mind the weight of the weapons you choose, since heavier options will purportedly slow down your movement quite noticeably.

However, after this presentation, the title went silent for nearly two whole years, with the exception to a couple of screenshots published by Acony from time to time. Parabellum was eventually showed again in September 2008 to Gamesradar:

(…) Powered by the Unreal Engine 3, coats of physics, lighting, and animation tech color its two main modes: a non-linear campaign and team deathmatch. We’re trying out the former, a scenario that sees us (and our four counter-terrorist teammates), with just 10 minutes to stop a nuke in New York. But before we can cut wires dramatically, we have to complete our immediate objective: disarming/planting/rescuing stuff of lesser value. So far, still so Counter-Strike. A first map takes us just a few minutes.
Quickly, we’re progressing through different maps, attacking additional objectives. The aim is to keep campaigns, like the rounds, brief. At the moment, they’re somewhere between 10 and 40 minutes, with the map list differing depending on which campaign you select. It’s not long before we’re running the final map, disarming the big, bad nuke that wants to blow the Big Apple’s house down.

Just before its launch into closed beta, Acony signed a deal with K2 Network in March 2009, planning to host the game on their Gamersfirst portal:

GamersFirst, a service of K2 Network and one of today’s most popular free2play online game destinations, announces Parabellum, a brand new Free2Play massive multiplayer online First persons Shooter.
“Parabellum will set the standard of what to expect from Free2Play games,” said David Demers, Associate Producer of Parabellum. “Bringing quality Triple-A titles to the Free-to-Play market raises the bar for all and sets GamersFirst apart from the rest.”
Set in a world in a not too distant future, the privatization of global military forces has created highly profitable opportunities for ex-soldiers, mercenaries and adventurers. Gamers must choose their alignments carefully to survive. You must join forces with one of the two foremost covert reconnaissance organizations in the world. The CTF; an organization avowed to keeping anarchy at bay, or the Syndicate; a legion of bloodthirsty rebels bent on destruction and chaos. Each of them are solicited by the C.I.N. a Global Mercenary Network that provides contract missions to each of these factions who vie against one another with the fate of the World as the ultimate prize.

Unfortunately, after going into closed beta, then into public beta during the course of 2009, the development of the game seems to have slowed down before being stopped in October 2010, when K2 Network announced that they were withdrawing from the game:

The Unreal Engine 3-based free-to-play first person shooter Parabellum is now without a US-based publisher. GamersFirst, who announced plans to publish the game back in 2009, have now posted up a note on the company’s message board that, “{developer) Acony and GamersFirst have mutually agreed to stop operating Parabellum on gamersfirst.com. Further information will be made available at a later date.”
The modern day-themed first person shooter also appears to be AWOL on the game’s own web site. The site currently seems to be in a design holding pattern. The game’s official message boards also don’t offer much in terms of development updates.

Parabellum was canceled soon after this announcement.

After Parabellum’s cancellation, Acony will go on Bullet Run, another Free to Play multiplayer First-Person Shooter, which used assets and design ideas initially made for Parabellum. The game was met with negative reception by the press and Acony was soon forced to shutdown their operations, alongside the servers of Bullet Run.

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