10 Canceled Open-World Games You Wish They Hadn't Killed

From Star Wars' 'Project Orca' to Scalebound, these open-world titles could have been great!

Star Wars Orca
LucasArts

As we begin our inexorable march towards the next generation of games consoles (PlayStation 5 and Xbox Series X are so close we can smell the sleek, sleek plastic), we mark the time as we always do: with a combination of excitement, wariness and silly memes about the PS5’s controller.

Those first two factors are the most important here. As hyped as gamers are for these new systems, there are also those who wonder just how much more advanced they can be. Titles like Red Dead Redemption 2 have pushed the boundaries of what’s possible with vast, ambitious open-world games, so where can we go from here?

Even with advanced technology powering it, sometimes ambition just pushes too far. A lot of incredibly promising open-world concepts have had to be abandoned in the past, after all, because the creators tried to run a marathon before they could even cross their garden without collapsing in a wheezing ball.

Here are just some of the open-world projects that could have been something truly great, if they’d just managed to get off the ground.

10. The Flash

Star Wars Orca
The CW

Well, this would have been a doozy. As you’ll probably know, Marvel’s Spider-Man was one of the most successful open-world adventures of recent years, especially in the superhero sphere. This 2018 romp through a brilliantly realized New York City was a real blast, a slam dunk from Insomniac Games and a great exclusive coup for PS4.

Before all of this, though, a very different red-clad superhero was set to bring us his own open-world title: The Flash. Brash Entertainment had been working with Warner Bros. on the project, which was set to be released back in 2009.

Its focus was on Wally West rather than original Flash Barry Allen, and it was set to take our hero across various different cities (including Batman’s beloved haunt, Gotham). Understandably, this ambition was later scaled back to key locales, and some considerable progress was made on the game before disaster struck: Brash Entertainment was forced to close its doors in 2008 and the game was abandoned.

From the footage that remains of the title in its in-progress state, it’s clear that this would have been a whole lot of fun and a real passion project (so many character cameos and epic encounters were planned), and it’s such a shame that the team didn’t get the chance to finish what they started.

Contributor

Chris Littlechild hasn't written a bio just yet, but if they had... it would appear here.