Amazon Cancels Its New Game, Breakaway

Breakaway, the competitive video game developed by retailer Amazon's internal game studio, has been canceled. The developer, Amazon Game Studios, announced over the weekend that it has canceled the game "after a lot of soul searching," and is now instead moving on to pursue "new ideas" instead.

"While we have developed many ideas and made a lot of progress, we are also setting a very high bar for ourselves," Amazon said. "In spite of our efforts, we didn't achieve the breakthrough that made the game what we all hoped it could be. After a lot of soul searching, the team decided to focus on new ideas. As a result, Breakaway is no longer in active development."

The cancellation statement continues: "We remain exceptionally proud of the team's work, and feel privileged to have been a part of such a dedicated and enthusiastic community."

Amazon Game Studios left the smallest glimmer of hope for Breakaway, saying it could return to the project "if a thunderbolt of inspiration strikes." The official word is that "Breakaway is no longer in active development."

This is no big surprise, as Kotaku reported back in October 2017 that Breakaway, a 4v4 game, was canceled. The shutdown of the project came after Amazon reportedly held multiple public tests. Presumably the feedback was not as enthusiastic as Amazon would have wanted.

So now Breakaway will join the ranks of canceled games that includes titles like Scalebound, Star Wars 1313, Titan, and others.

While Breakaway is canceled, Amazon Game Studios has multiple titles in the works, including an open-ended sandbox game called New World and a third-person sci-fi game called Crucible. Amazon had a big hiring push years ago, bringing on Portal designer Kim Swift and Far Cry 2 director Clint Hocking, though they left the studio without releasing anything. Now, former Sony Online Entertainment boss John Smedley is heading up Amazon Game Studios in San Diego.