Arise, battered and discarded sequel; your service is required once more. After Yager's deal to develop Dead Island 2 collapsed in mysterious circumstances last year—causing the dissolution of the Yager Productions division—the future of the Dead Island franchise beyond misjudged MOBAs and HD remakes has been in limbo. Now it has a developer once more: the UK's Sumo Digital.
I feel like we should have called it—Sumo is heavyweight champion when it comes to working with third-party IP. Disney Infinity, Forza, LittleBigPlanet and Sonic have all passed through its doors. It'll also be taking charge of the PC port of Rock Band 4 on the off-chance Harmonix's Fig campaign pulls through.
"Sumo showed so much understanding of the brand, had creative ideas and an excellent vision that was aligned with our own,” Koch Media (Deep Silver's parent company) CEO Klemens Kundratitz told MCV.
Contrast this with the scant information we have surrounding Deep Silver's divorce from Yager, a lone statement in which Yager CEO Timo Ullman explained that "Yager and Deep Silver's respective visions of the project fell out of alignment."
Sumo Digital, may your vision be ever aligned.
