They were buried, but they came out: legendary long-term construction projects that outlived their creators

Final Fantasy XV

The fifteenth part of the famous JRPG franchise from Square Enix was originally called Final Fantasy Versus XIII. It was part of a separate sub-series Fabula Nova Crystallis, announced in 2006. Then, at E3, the developers simultaneously presented three games: Final Fantasy XIII, Final Fantasy Agito XIII (later Type-0) and Final Fantasy Versus XIII. The latter was conceived as a dark spin-off with an emphasis on realism, drama and dynamic battles in the open world. However, the developers quickly encountered difficulties.

The game was supposed to use the new Crystal Tools engine. But it was created for the linear thirteenth part and was poorly suited for the open world. There were also problems with the budget and release dates, which were constantly shifting. It was impossible to concentrate normally on work, since part of the development team was regularly transferred to other projects. Especially when Final Fantasy XIV had to be saved after a disastrous launch.

Versus XIII was almost never shown to the public for a long time. Atmospheric trailers were released periodically, but real development was very slow. After six years, the game was about 25% ready.

In 2012, Square Enix made a radical decision: Versus XIII was renamed Final Fantasy XV and the leader was changed — Tetsuya Nomura gave way to Hajime Tabata. The game ceased to be part of Fabula Nova Crystallis and moved to eighth-generation consoles.

The fifteenth part was released four years after the restart of production — November 29, 2016 — and was received relatively warmly. The open world, beautiful graphics, emotional story and amazing soundtrack were praised. However, many players and critics noted the consequences of the rush: the plot seemed unfinished, and some important moments were taken out in the full-length film Kingsglaive, anime and DLC.

Moreover, towards the end, the open-world project turned into a long and tedious corridor action game, and all the previous advantages disappeared sharply.

The combat system was also criticized, because only the main character was playable. Battles for Noctis were reduced to monotonously pressing a couple of buttons, and the remaining three characters could only be given orders.

Future updates fixed the problems. The second half remained linear, but it can now be shortened. The combat system has expanded, as the developers have allowed switching to other characters — even if you first need to unlock them in the skill tree.

Today, Final Fantasy XV is perfect for getting acquainted with the franchise. This is a high-quality JRPG with its own unique style, atmosphere, good gameplay, touching fairy-tale story and full Russian localization.

Duke Nukem Forever

After the huge success of Duke Nukem 3D in 1996, the developers from 3D Realms immediately started working on the sequel. It was announced in April 1997 under the name Duke Nukem Forever. The game was supposed to be a breakthrough: huge levels, an interactive world, advanced AI and even more of the franchise's signature style.

Development started almost immediately and lasted for 14 years — from 1997 to 2011. During this time, the project went through:

• several complete reboots;
• multiple changes of game engines;
• an endless pursuit of the ideal — new mechanics were constantly added that contradicted the original idea;
• staff shortages and lack of a clear plan;
• funding problems.

The studio repeatedly showed trailers and screenshots that attracted public attention, but real progress was minimal. The game became a real meme and a symbol of a project that would never be released.

In 2009, 3D Realms went practically bankrupt. Because of this, development was stopped, and most of the team left the studio.

In 2010, Gearbox Software, with the participation of Take-Two Interactive, bought the rights to the franchise. They brought in additional studios — Triptych Games and Piranha Games — and hastily finished the game in a year and a half.

Duke Nukem Forever was released on June 10, 2011. The project received mostly negative reviews: complaints were made about the archaic gameplay, primitive level design, weak and outdated humor, as well as technical problems. There was a strong feeling that the game was stuck somewhere between 1999 and 2005. Many called it the biggest disappointment of the decade.

Sales of the project were significantly below Take-Two's expectations. According to various estimates, about 1.5–2 million copies were sold, although it was planned that more than 3 million would be sold.

There were no sequels. The game left its mark on the history of the gaming industry as an example of how the best is the enemy of the good.

Lost Soul Aside

The story of Lost Soul Aside began with a lone developer named Yang Bing. He started working on the game of his dreams in 2014 and two years later posted a five-minute combat trailer on YouTube.

The video gained 1.5 million views and attracted the attention of Sony. She included Lost Soul Aside in the Sony China Hero Project support program for Chinese developers.

As a result, in 2017, the team of creators grew to three people, and in 2018, Yang Bing founded Ultizero Games. Over time, it expanded to about 40 people, but the project still remained very personal.

Over 11 years of development, Lost Soul Aside has experienced many difficulties:

• transition from one person to a team and management problems;
• script revision;
• the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic;
• loss of key employees;
• multiple postponements;
• personal sacrifices of Yang Bing himself, who mentioned that he "lost his hair, girlfriend, and a lot of energy."

The game was released on August 29, 2025, and received mixed reviews. Many noted the beautiful visual style, excellent combat system, as well as the sincere passion of the developers. But there was also enough criticism: they talked about performance issues, a short campaign and weak storytelling, as well as poor voice acting and ridiculous staging. Currently, Lost Soul Aside's rating on Steam is holding at 59% positive reviews. The project failed to attract a wide audience, despite Sony's support.

Lost Soul Aside is a prime example of how the perseverance of one person and the support of a major publisher help a solo project grow into a full-fledged game.

Skull and Bones

After the success of naval battles in Assassin's Creed IV: Black Flag, Ubisoft decided to develop this idea. The French developers conceived a multiplayer project focused on piracy: treasure hunts, pirate spirit, and large-scale naval battles.

The development was entrusted to Ubisoft Singapore, for which this was a debut — the Singapore government even allocated subsidies. Initially, the game was called Black Flag Infinite, but later it was renamed Skull and Bones and detached from the Assassin's Creed universe.

The announcement took place at E3 in 2017, but the release had to wait until February 2024. The project was postponed six times, and it underwent several complete reboots. During this time, the Singapore studio repeatedly changed leaders and the overall vision of the game, the Paris office actively interfered in the creative process, and the staff turnover was very high.

Although Ubisoft called Skull and Bones one of the first "AAAA games" (quadruple-A), many players and journalists met it coolly. Naval battles were praised, but world exploration, resource gathering with one button, monotonous activities, and weak land gameplay were disappointing. They resembled mobile service games.

Today, Ubisoft is trying to support the game with updates, but the average daily online presence is around 200–350 people on Steam. And the maximum figure was only 2615 simultaneous players in August 2024.

Skull and Bones became an example of a project that should have been canceled and forgotten long ago, instead of dragging it to the end.

Hollow Knight: Silksong

The first Hollow Knight was released in 2017 and became a hit — the game sold over 15 million copies. Players loved it for its excellent and challenging gameplay, engaging lore, and dark atmosphere.

This success allowed the developers from Team Cherry studio to take on the sequel. Initially, the sequel was conceived as an addition to the original game, but over time the project grew significantly in scale.

Two years later, Team Cherry introduced Hollow Knight: Silksong. The main character in the second part was Hornet. In the first game, she was both an opponent and an ally of the main character. The sequel promised an even bigger world, more dynamic gameplay, new mechanics, and the familiar atmosphere of a dark but beautiful kingdom of insects.

For a long time, the developers were silent, turning Silksong into a meme. After all, every major gaming event was accompanied by jokes like: "Silksong will be shown now!".

In 2023, Team Cherry postponed the project, and in August 2025, the developers unexpectedly announced the release date — September 4, 2025. This came as a shock, because many indie studios that had planned releases for the near future were urgently postponing their games so as not to compete with the "GTA of the indie world".

The development of Hollow Knight: Silksong was carried out in a small team and without pressure from major publishers. Team Cherry simply created a game they wanted to play and didn't rush. And the players appreciated it: in the first months, sales exceeded 7 million copies, not counting the millions of players who tried the project through the Game Pass service. And the release of the project "collapsed" the Steam servers.

Vampire: The Masquerade – Bloodlines 2

The announcement of the sequel to the RPG Vampire: The Masquerade – Bloodlines took place in 2019, 15 years after the release of the cult original.

The action of Vampire: The Masquerade — Bloodlines 2 was moved to modern Seattle, and the main "feature" was supposed to be a deep plot, choices with consequences, different vampire clans, and the atmosphere of a dark world.

Paradox Interactive became the publisher of the project, and the American studio Hardsuit Labs was entrusted with the development. The game was supposed to become a more modern Action-RPG, while maintaining the spirit of the original.

But the second "Bloodlines" fell into "production hell": the release date was constantly postponed, and mass layoffs occurred in the studio. In 2021, Paradox Interactive removed Hardsuit Labs from development. The studio itself underwent massive cuts, which caused key employees to leave the project, including narrative director Brian Mitsoda.

In 2023, the project was transferred to the British studio The Chinese Room, which restarted development. The approach to storytelling became more linear and focused on the story, and many mechanics were reworked. The release was postponed several more times, trying to better polish the game.

The long-awaited release took place on October 21, 2025, but the reviews were mixed. Many liked the atmosphere, voice acting, dialogues, and fidelity to the World of Darkness lore. But the project was criticized for its simplified gameplay, weak freedom of choice, technical condition, and the fact that the game was more like a movie than a full-fledged RPG with deep role-playing.

In Steam, the maximum online presence was about 27 thousand simultaneous players on the release day, but soon the average daily figure dropped to 100–300 people. According to the publishers, sales were below expectations. Paradox Interactive took the blame and wrote off about $37 million in development costs.

Shenmue III

The first two parts of Shenmue were among the most expensive and ambitious games on Dreamcast. But due to low sales, Sega closed the franchise after the second part. Despite the huge love of the community, the story of Ryo Hazuki was cut short.

Everything changed in 2015, when the creator of the series, Yu Suzuki, unexpectedly announced the threequel at E3, launching a campaign on Kickstarter. It sensationally raised $2 million in a record nine hours, and 6.3 million in total. And with additional fees, this amount grew to 7.2 million. In addition, Sony and Deep Silver invested in the project.

The game was created by Ys Net studio on the Unreal Engine 4. Development lasted four and a half years — the release date was postponed several times. Shenmue III was released on November 19, 2019.

The game received cool reviews. Although fans of the original praised the fidelity to the spirit of the series, the detailed world, the atmosphere and the opportunity to immerse themselves in Ryo's life again, critics and most players were disappointed with the project. They scolded the outdated gameplay, weak graphics, bad animations, technical problems and the feeling that the game looks like a project from the beginning of the "zeroes", and not from 2019. The main problem was that the plot advanced very little, and the players never received the long-awaited finale.

Although Shenmue III did not pay off, in 2025 Ys Net and new partner ININ Games introduced Shenmue III Enhanced. This is an improved version of the project with 4K textures, DLSS and FSR support, increased NPC density, optimization and other edits. The release is scheduled for the end of 2026.

Yu Suzuki still hopes to make Shenmue IV someday, but there are no concrete plans yet.

Cyberpunk 2077

CD Projekt Red announced the adaptation of Mike Pondsmith's cult tabletop RPG back in 2012. But full-fledged development started only in 2016, after the completion of all additions to The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt.

Cyberpunk 2077 promised a huge open world from the city of Night City and its surroundings, a deep non-linear plot, choices with serious consequences, an advanced character editor and an incredible level of detail. The main star of the project was Keanu Reeves, who played Johnny Silverhand.

The game was released on December 10, 2020, almost nine years after the announcement, and ended up in one of the biggest scandals in the history of the gaming industry. All because of the terrible technical condition, especially on the basic consoles of the past generation. The project suffered from a huge number of bugs, crashes, low performance and cut content. Sony even temporarily removed the game from sale in the PlayStation Store. Players demanded refunds, and CDPR faced investigations and class action lawsuits. Their shares collapsed by 75%.

The company publicly acknowledged the mistakes, stating that it underestimated the complexity of the project and focused too much on the release after the postponements. The Poles greatly overestimated the expectations of the players with their advertising campaign, showing impressive trailers of the game, which did not correspond to reality.

To the credit of the developers, instead of abandoning "Cyberpunk", they began to fix it. From 2021 to 2023, CD Projekt Red released dozens of major patches, completely reworking the mechanics in version 2.0. And in September 2023, an excellent story addition, Phantom Liberty, was released with Idris Elba as Solomon Reed.

Financially, the project became a huge success: by November 2025, the main game had sold more than 35 million copies, and Phantom Liberty — more than 10 million. Today, the daily online in Steam stays around 35–40 thousand simultaneous players, and the historical maximum exceeded 1 million.

CDPR is still releasing updates — for example, a special version for PS5 Pro was recently released. And at the same time, the developers are working on the next game in the franchise.

Escape from Tarkov

The development of a hardcore tactical extraction shooter from the Russian studio Battlestate Games started in 2014. The game was conceived as part of the "Russia 2028" universe, which was invented back in 2009.

The first public trailer of "Tarkov" was released in 2015. A year later, in August 2016, a closed alpha started, and in July 2017 — a closed beta. Since then, the game has been in early access for about eight years.

Over the years, Escape from Tarkov has grown from a niche project into a real cult. Slowly but surely, the studio added new maps and weapons, a shelter system, bosses, quests and mechanics.

There was no criticism. The game got it for long content delays, regular problems with cheaters, the unofficial possibility of selling loot for real money and strong monetization. Especially controversial were expensive editions like Edge of Darkness for $150 and Unheard Edition for $250.

The era of early access ended on November 15, 2025. The release was loud: in the first month after the release, the game sold more than a million copies both in Steam and in its own launcher.

Reviews of version 1.0 were mixed: they praised the atmosphere, the tension of the raids and the depth, but noted that the game is still raw. There were many bugs and a lack of optimization, and the old problems were never fixed. In the first two months after the release, only about 10 thousand players reached the ending.

Today, Escape from Tarkov continues to evolve. The studio has introduced a new system of seasonal wipes, continues to add content and improve performance. The daily audience in Steam stays around 15-20 thousand active users. And given that most players use their own Battlestate Games launcher, this figure increases several times.

In any case, Escape from Tarkov is a unique example of a harsh and realistic extraction shooter that has greatly influenced the genre. The game has spawned many followers: ARC Raiders, Hunt: Showdown, Marathon, and so on.

Starfield

The space RPG from Bethesda Game Studios was conceived as The Elder Scrolls in space: a vast universe with a non-linear plot, hundreds of planets available for exploration, ship building, and a sense of freedom in the spirit of Bethesda. Todd Howard has repeatedly emphasized the scale of the project and promised "the biggest game in the studio's history."

Development started immediately after Fallout 4 — in 2015. Starfield was announced at E3 in 2018, but it was not released until September 6, 2023. The project took eight years to create.

After its release, Starfield received mixed reviews. The game was praised for its ship building, well-developed faction storylines, and interesting world quests. At the same time, the project was criticized for its monotonous planets, empty world, outdated graphics and animations, as well as a weak main plot.

The game was created on the old, albeit refined to the second version, Creation Engine. This had a bad effect on the technical part, adding criticism to the project. Especially for the huge number of loading screens that occur when moving between locations.

At launch, Starfield set a record for Bethesda games: peak online in Steam exceeded 330 thousand simultaneous players, and the total audience for the first months was 13–14 million. Although mainly thanks to Game Pass.

Further support turned out to be modest. In September 2024, the first story addition was released — Shattered Space. But the DLC was also criticized for the small amount of content, boring tasks, poor technical condition and high cost of 30 dollars.

Bethesda continues to release free updates with improvements. And the second major DLC and port to PlayStation 5 were released on April 7, 2026.

Bonus: Star Citizen

The multiplayer space simulator from Cloud Imperium Games has been in development for more than 13 years. The project was announced in 2012, launching a campaign on Kickstarter. It raised $2.1 million, and then funding completely moved to the company's own website.

To date, the studio, led by Chris Roberts, has collected more than $950 million in donations from players. This allowed Cloud Imperium Games to expand: open several offices, hire hundreds of employees and create its own StarEngine engine.

During its existence, Star Citizen has experienced many postponements, changes in priorities, technical difficulties and constant accusations of delaying development. The project promises a universe with thousands of players influencing each other and the world, remembering all the changes. As well as detailed planets, ship building, advanced economics, professions, PvP/PvE and a single-player campaign Squadron 42.

Mark Hamill, Gary Oldman, Henry Cavill and other famous actors were involved in the work on Squadron 42. At the end of 2025, the developers said that the story can already be fully completed, and the release will take place in 2026. However, many do not trust such statements, and the cautious wording of Cloud Imperium Games only exacerbates skepticism.

Although the development has turned into the most expensive "production hell" in history, the game itself has become a dream for many, allowing them to plunge into a well-developed fantasy world.