14 DAY TRIAL // Starting this week, you can add a new name on the growing list of people who left Ubisoft or were laid off by the French developer throughout 2020: Michel Ancel. Mostly known for creating the Rayman franchise, Ancel has been praised for Beyond Good & Evil, which is why we've been so excited when we learned that he's going to direct the sequel the cult game.
Unfortunately, Michel Ancel will no longer helm the direction of Beyond Good & Evil 2, Ubisoft confirmed today in a statement. After working on a personal project dedicated to the protection of wildlife for a long time, Ancel decided to put his full effort into this longstanding passion, thus quitting the video games industry.
According to Ubisoft and as noted by Michel Ancel, he hasn't been directly involved in Beyond Good & Evil 2 for some time, so the project should be in good hands going forward. Moreover, Senior Producer Guillaume Brunier said that the team has passed an important internal milestone, delivering a build that proves Ubisoft's Space Pirate Fantasy and offers hours of gameplay and an incredible level of freedom in a seamless online sandbox.
As development for Beyond Good & Evil 2 ramps up, more resources are dedicated to the project. As such, Ubisoft Paris has been added as a partner studio recently, and in the past six months, a lot of new people have joined Ubisoft Montpellier, the studio behind Beyond Good & Evil 2.
If you can't wait to learn more about Beyond Good & Evil 2, you'll be happy to know that Ubisoft plans to share more and show us the game in action sometime next year, once the studio passes the next internal production milestones.
That being said, we hope what we'll be shown about Beyond Good & Evil 2 in 2021 will be worthy of Ancel's legacy and true to his vision.