After a change of publisher, the Polish studio had little chance of getting its cooperative action RPG out to the public, and now it’s safe to say that the chances of that happening are zero percent.

Project Dagger was in development for several years, and it was a co-op, melee-based action RPG. According to the Polish studio’s website, it was supposed to be a AAA game, worked on by their studio in New York, and at one point had at least fifty developers working on the project. The original IP was dated 2025 or 2026 and would have been the first episode of a new franchise.

However, MauroNL reported on Twitter that the Polish company informed its investors earlier this month that it would cease development on Project Dagger on April 5. They decided to cancel the project because they were rethinking the game’s scope and commercial potential. As a result of the cancellation, People Can Fly’s 2023 financial results will be reduced by $16.9 million, and its consolidated financial results will also take a $19.75 million hit. The game was originally going to be published by Take-Two’s subsidiary Private Division, but in 2022, Take-Two dropped Project Dagger.

People Can Fly have decided to discontinue further work on Project Dagger, a new action-adventure IP that has been in development for a multiple years.

The game was to be published by Take-Two but that agreement was ended in September 2022.

PCF expects impairments of ~$17-20m. pic.twitter.com/FpPd70GB1t

— MauroNL (@MauroNL3) April 25, 2024

People Can Fly would then publish the game itself. The studio is known for Painkiller, Bulletstorm, Gears of War: Judgment and Outriders. The company has also recently been forced to make layoffs, as in January they reportedly had to lay off 30 people working on an unannounced Square Enix project.

One wonders how close People Can Fly will come to bankruptcy after this. We have already heard from them about Outriders that their royalties from that game were not very high, and an unknown project being developed for Square Enix may have also thwarted the Polish team’s plans. The team doesn’t seem to be able to publish their own games (they’re not Quantic Dream after all), and the cancellation of Project Dagger proves it.

Source: VGC