Jeff Grubb has some interesting new rumors about the Knights of the Old Republic remake.
Jeff addressed this directly on Twitter, replying to someone asking him about the game. Jeff said:
“My understanding is that Sony wants nothing to do with it anymore, which is why I thought it was dead. Obviously, though, Saber still seems very determined. And I have a lot of trust in Saber.”
Jeff confirmed what Sony hadn’t officially confirmed that they were to be the publisher of the game, until they pulled. Again, what Jeff is referring to here was reported by Jason Schreier in Bloomberg, but never officially confirmed by any of the parties involved.
So it certainly looks like the Knights of the Old Republic remake is still coming, but without the official stamp of approval from Sony. If we take Schreier’s reporting at face value, that reflected the quality of the title when Aspyr was still working on the remake, which was not up to Sony’s expectations. Given the high expectations on the PlayStation 5, and for the Star Wars license, it was certainly not something that any studio can just take for granted.
Aspyr did go through with releasing Star Wars Battlefront Classic Collection, which was essentially unplayable online when it launched because of technical issues, and a criminal lack of servers. We don’t’ want to get too harsh in this assessment; online issues aside, Aspyr appears to have made a faithful port of both Star Wars Battlefront games.
But we will say we can’t blame Sony for not wanting to have anything to do with the Knights of the Old Republic remake because of this. As for Saber Interactive, they are not at the level of the biggest game companies like Rockstar Games, Ubisoft, or Electronic Arts. They are still a studio with a loyal following, and a following that’s big enough to make their releases sell in the hundred thousands, if not millions.
We had mentioned this before, but whether you would personally still be excited for this Knights of the Old Republic remake depends largely on how much you like Saber. If you don’t know much about them or played their games much, you may find that their work could go either way.
That is, unless, Saber takes this opportunity to prove that they’re a better studio than everyone thinks they are. This project is certainly a perfect opportunity to get the world’s attention on how much better they have become at making games. So the ball is now on Saber’s court to demonstrate just that.
