End of Unknown 9 Franchise
The studio responsible for the ambitious cross between Assassin’s Creed and Tomb Raider, Unknown 9, has announced the closure of the franchise due to the underperformance of its initial video game released last year.
According to Herve Hoerdt, the head of developer Reflector Entertainment, Unknown 9: Awakening featuring Anya Chalotra from The Witcher TV series, fell short of the company’s expectations and did not justify further investment in the universe.
As a result, one of Reflector’s upcoming projects, likely another Unknown 9 installment in the conceptualization stage, has been scrapped, leading to the discontinuation of this development line.
Performance of Unknown 9: Awakening
Hoerdt explained, “This decision aligns directly with the setback of the studio’s ambitious and daring initial project, a new IP with an expansive transmedia world.”
Reflector had envisioned a future for Unknown 9 as a series complemented by podcasts, comics, novels, and web series. Despite the release of many of these materials before Awakening’s launch, the delay in the video game’s release negatively impacted their reception.
In response to this development, Reflector will undergo another round of layoffs following previous job cuts in November 2024, as the studio shifts towards a single-project strategy for the foreseeable future.
Future Project
The upcoming project from Reflector will be based on an existing Bandai Namco IP and is showing promising progress, Hoerdt confirmed.