The original code was lost when Westwood Studios, the studio behind the game, was acquired by Electronic Arts.
The year 2020 was chosen for the return of a highly successful graphic adventure, but in line with everything that happened in this unfortunate year, which will be remembered by the coronavirus, Blade Runner: Enhanced Edition not only will not arrive on time, but it has been delayed indefinitely. This has been confirmed by Stephen Kick, CEO of Nightdive Studios, in statements to Eurogamer, where he has recognized problems related to the old technology.
“There have been some obstacles that we have encountered due to the old technology that it uses,” he said. “Our search for the source code and materials has been unsuccessful.” The truth is that the source code was lost when Westwood Studios joined the ranks of Electronic Arts. The studio was disbanded some time later, but Nightdive Studios has tried to find it and has contacted EA itself.
Unsuccessful conversations
“We have had some words with EA about what they have saved from Blade Runner, but we have not gotten a clear answer,” he acknowledged. “And even if there was something, it is highly unlikely that they would provide it to us for legal reasons, mainly, which is a bit disappointing, as we expected to at least get the original audio of the recordings. So we are basically working on what was in the original game at the moment, without having access to any original resources. “
Blade Runner: Enhanced Edition was planned for PlayStation 4, Xbox One, PC, and Nintendo Switch. At the moment they have not announced possible new platforms, but without a launch date, we are already entering the realm of the new generation of consoles. Be that as it may, the study recently showed a comparison between the cinematic scenes of yesteryear and the current ones. The difference? The originals ran at 15 fps at 640×480, while the new ones hit 4K and run at 60 fps.
