A former Rockstar Games developer published a now-deleted blog explaining why PS3 exclusive Agent was canceled, drawing the company’s ire. The information comes from former technical director Obbe Vermeij who spent over a decade at Rockstar before moving on in 2009, after having worked on GTA 4.
Rockstar canceled PS3’s Agent to prioritize GTA 4, says former dev
Unfortunately for Rockstar, Vermeij’s post has already been making rounds, and there’s also Google Cache. According to him, Agent was born out of some Rockstar devs’ desire to do something other than Grand Theft Auto. The pitch seems to have impressed higher-ups who gave their blessings to go ahead, and the plan was to split Rockstar North between GTA 4 and Agent.
“It was a James Bond game and Jimmy is the Scottish version of James,” Vermeij wrote. “The game was to be set in the 70s, be more linear than GTA with a number of locations. There was a French Mediterranean city, A Swiss ski resort, Cairo and at the end there would be a big shootout with lasers in space.”
Vermeij concedes that Agent’s development wasn’t progressing well, but the team tried to salvage it by cutting content. However, that was all in vain because Agent was considered a “distraction.” “I think it was handed over to another company within Rockstar but never got completed,” Vermeij added, revealing that eventually everyone had to get behind GTA 4.
After pulling his blog, Vermeij penned a new entry stating that he received an unpleasant call from Rockstar and didn’t want to upset his former colleagues.
