It says a lot that Rockstar's least popular franchise at this point is the one where you played a law-abiding citizen. Where Grand Theft Auto and the Red Dead series get countless sequels, spin-offs and DLCs, LA Noire came out yonks ago and doesn't seem to be getting a follow-up any time soon. Which might be why their first attempt at putting you on the right side of the legal divide never got past the pre-production stage, despite it looking hella exciting and groundbreaking. A GTA-style open evironment, except instead of a crook working his way through the criminal underworld you play a secret agent during the Cold War, with lots of gadgets, intrigue, and espionage fun? That sounds pretty incredible if you ask us. Even on the Playstation 2 and Xbox as they were being developed it could've been pretty great; after all, it was that generation that gave us Vice City, the indisputable best GTA game. Later upgraded to a PS3 exclusive, Agent was supposed to "take players on a paranoid journey into the world of counter-intelligence, espionage, and political assassinations". The Scottish-based Rockstar North who've been behind all of the studio's biggest hits were making it, Take Two president Ben Feder claimed the game would be "genre-defining" and "a whole new way of experiencing videogames that we haven't really seen before." Which is big talk for a title we were already pretty pumped for. Details were first announced back in 2009, with a plan to release the following year; four years later, we haven't heard a peep out of Rockstar, besides rumours that the company update the copyright on the name in 2013. They're probably too busy with, y'know, their other phenomenally successful franchises to start a new one.
Tom Baker is the Comics Editor at WhatCulture! He's heard all the Doctor Who jokes, but not many about Randall and Hopkirk. He also blogs at http://communibearsilostate.wordpress.com/
