Remember Beyond Good & Evil 2? The Ubisoft game last seen publicly at E3 2017, coming up on seventeen years of development? Well, believe it or not, it’s still actively being worked on. In fact, Ubisoft is hiring new staff to work on it.
This is proven by a hot new job listing for a technical sound designer popping up overnight, a role that’ll explicitly be working at Ubisoft Montpellier on the infamous sequel. The job description also provides an up-to-date description of what Beyond Good & Evil 2 will actually be.
This description reads: “Beyond Good & Evil 2 is an action-adventure open world game set in a captivating space opera universe and the direct prequel to the 2003 cult classic. Based on a breakthrough technology driven by the proprietary Voyager engine, Beyond Good & Evil 2 aims to offer a seamless experience of exploration and space piracy across a solar system full of exotic locations, colorful characters and mysteries to uncover, solo or with friends. So, if you are ready for an adventure like no other, come join forces with us to build System 3!”
Beyond Good & Evil 2 has gone through the ringer when it comes to development, as you’d expect given how long it’s been in Ubisoft’s oven. The game got a new creative director last year, with original creator Michel Ancel saying the troubled development came down to “passionate managers” not getting along. The anniversary edition of Beyond Good & Evil, released last year, included new cutscenes that further pointed to the sequel’s existence. So in spite of all the messiness, there does seem to be a relatively recent push to get this game made.
Ubisoft has been going through a drastic shift in structure and focus recently. Earlier this year it established Vantage Studios with Tencent, a new subsidiary that now owns many of Ubisoft’s major franchises. Montpellier, and Beyond Good & Evil 2, did not move over to this new gaming venture.
Then there’s the recent AI push, with Ubisoft CEO Yves Guillemot stating that he believes generative AI will be as big a revolution for the video game industry as the leap to 3D. Worth noting is that generative AI software isn’t mentioned in this Beyond Good & Evil 2 job post.
So there we have it, a sign of life from Beyond Good & Evil 2 yet again. Though after a while, one would hope you’d stop seeing signs of life and actual life itself. This decade, hopefully!
