Splash Damage, the UK-based studio behind the long-in-development Transformers: Reactivate, has delivered some terrible news this week. The cooperative action game, announced in December 2022, will not be released.
The developer revealed that development on the title has ceased and confirmed that some roles may be lost as a result of this reduction.
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The announcement was made on Wednesday, after months of complete radio silence. Transformers fans expecting a triple-A experience from an established studio were still holding out hope that Transformers: Reactivate would reappear at The game Awards or some other show, but it never did. In fact, many had considered him dead.
“This decision was not made lightly and this is a difficult time for the studio and our people,” the statement read. “We want to take a moment to thank the team who worked on Transformers for their dedication and passion.”
Splash Damage also said it would like to work with licensee Hasbro again in the future, although that might be what it would look like in a situation like this. The developer has other titles in the works, although not with Hasbro, that it will now focus on.
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Part of why this news is disappointing is the loss of potential. We didn’t get to see much of Reactivate, but it was presented as a four-player online action game set in a post-invasion world where you would take command of some of the most well-known Autobots.
Splash Damage even acquired Bulkhead, the small indie studio behind multiplayer shooter Battalion 1944, to work on the game. A beta was scheduled for 2023 that never happened, and the developer then promised to share more in 2024, and nothing materialized.
If there’s a silver lining to this, it’s that some studios with open roles are already directing those at risk of redundancy to apply. We hope everyone finds a new job.
