Video Games

Remedy Entertainment cancels its premium co-op game

Development of Codename Kestrel won’t go ahead

Marco Wutz

Remedy Entertainment

Remedy Entertainment announced that it canceled the development of Codename Kestrel, the premium co-op multiplayer game it was working on as part of a collaboration with Tencent.

Kestrel was originally developed as a free-to-play game known as Codename Vanguard, which was upgraded to a premium experience in 2023 at no small cost to the company. Kestrel being axed perhaps explains why Remedy’s latest financials barely mentioned the project, which was listed as still being in the concept stage last week.

According to Remedy, Kestrel’s cancellation will allow the studio “to focus more on the other games in its portfolio.” It looks like the move will not result in any layoffs at the company with developers working on Kestrel being reassigned to other projects. Remedy noted reductions in operating and recruitment costs as additional advantages of this decision.

“Codename Kestrel showed early promise, but the project was still in its early concept stage. Our other projects have advanced well and are moving to the next stages of development, and increasing focus on them provides us with benefits,” Remedy CEO Tero Virtala explained. 

“We can reallocate talented Kestrel developers to these other game projects, and many of our support functions get additional focus on their operations. This is yet another means to ensure that our game projects continue advancing well. I want to thank our Kestrel development team. Though we decided to discontinue the project for wider Remedy benefits, our team has done good work and provided us with valuable learnings. I also want to thank Tencent for their partnership so far. They have been very professional and supportive,” he added.

Remedy currently has Alan Wake 2 DLC, Control 2, the Max Payne 1 & 2 Remake, and a title known as Codename Condor, which is based on the Control franchise, in the works.

The Finnish company recently reported a positive financial situation with its latest flagship title, Alan Wake 2, being on the way to break even a few months after its initial release.

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Marco Wutz

MARCO WUTZ

Marco Wutz is a writer from Parkstetten, Germany. He has a degree in Ancient History and a particular love for real-time and turn-based strategy games like StarCraft, Age of Empires, Total War, Age of Wonders, Crusader Kings, and Civilization as well as a soft spot for Genshin Impact and Honkai: Star Rail. He began covering StarCraft 2 as a writer in 2011 for the largest German community around the game and hosted a live tournament on a stage at gamescom 2014 before he went on to work for Bonjwa, one of the country's biggest Twitch channels. He branched out to write in English in 2015 by joining tl.net, the global center of the StarCraft scene run by Team Liquid, which was nominated as the Best Coverage Website of the Year at the Esports Industry Awards in 2017. He worked as a translator on The Crusader Stands Watch, a biography in memory of Dennis "INTERNETHULK" Hawelka, and provided live coverage of many StarCraft 2 events on the social channels of tl.net as well as DreamHack, the world's largest gaming festival. From there, he transitioned into writing about the games industry in general after his graduation, joining GLHF, a content agency specializing in video games coverage for media partners across the globe, in 2021. He has also written for NGL.ONE, kicker, ComputerBild, USA Today's ForTheWin, The Sun, Men's Journal, and Parade. Email: marco.wutz@glhf.gg