Lost PS4 Exclusive Confirmed To Return, Developer Regains Rights In Rare Deal With Sony

Five years after its release in October 2016 as a free game on PS4 and its subsequent closure 13 months later, The Tomorrow Children is set to make a comeback. Q-Games, the Kyoto-based indie developer behind the game, acquired the rights from publisher Sony Interactive Entertainment, returning the intellectual property of Tomorrow Children to creator Dylan Cuthbert and his team.

During a rare private server game video in September 2021, Q-Games CEO and founder Cuthbert told IGN Japan that he hoped to acquire the rights and relaunch The Tomorrow Children if Sony allowed it. A small but noisy audience has called for his return since public servants were shut down in November 2017, rendering the game unplayable, and Cuthbert says it was this dedication from fans that convinced him to continue negotiations. with Sony on the rights.

“I would like to first of all thank the fans of The Tomorrow Children, without whom I would never have had the confidence to continue pursuing this deal,” Cuthbert said in an announcement today. “Our fans are some of the most incredible players out there, and every day for the past four years they have kept the dream alive. I think the happiest thing about this decision is imagining the pleasure those fans will feel when they re-enter the crazy neo-Soviet post-apocalyptic world of The Tomorrow Children.

Have you played The Tomorrow Children?

YESNO

“Second, I would like to thank Sony Interactive Entertainment for also working with me to return the IP to Q-Games. It has taken a concerted effort from all of us to get to this last step, and I am filled with gratitude to everyone involved in the process. “

The Tomorrow Children was an online-only multiplayer experience where players collaborated to build cities, farm resources, and protect the world from attackers, all set in a surreal post-apocalypse with a Soviet inflection. The game received a mixed reception at launch and its servers were shut down just over a year later, but it built up a cult following.

Although no release date or platforms were announced, it appears that The Tomorrow Children will return in evolved form, as Cuthbert promised that he is “now tweaking and reworking parts of the game every week.” The Tomorrow Children was already a trailblazing title, having been developed in association with Sony from the very beginning of the PS4’s life cycle. Its advanced Voxel Cone Tracing graphics engine resulted in a Pixar-like visual presentation that still looks impressive today, while elements of its loose online cooperative system would later be reflected in games like Kojima Productions’ Death Stranding. . Along with planned updates, we can expect the new version of The Tomorrow Children to look right at home alongside modern games when it finally launches.

In the meantime, Q-Games will publish a newsletter with behind-the-scenes updates so fans can see how development is progressing. Registration for the newsletter is available here.

“I hope everyone continues and gets involved in this process,” Cuthbert said. “We plan to make quite a few changes to improve and give The Tomorrow Children the relaunch it deserves! Come see the fun! “

Cuthbert has a close relationship with Sony, having worked there for a period around the turn of the millennium, and has been involved in the backend aspects of various PlayStation consoles since the PS2, including the rubber duck technical demo. the PS2 and the PS3. XrossMediaBar interface. Q-Games’ flagship PixelJunk series was closely associated with PlayStation platforms for many years and helped increase player interest in indie games on Sony consoles. The Tomorrow Children was developed by Q-Games and published by SIE, with production support from Sony’s Japan Studio.

Specific details of the deal between Q-Games and SIE were not announced.

Sony has occasionally collaborated with the creators of its classic IP on reissues, such as working with Parappa The Rapper creator Masaya Matsuura on a PS4 remaster, but has generally held on to the rights to the vast majority of its franchises. second parts. This makes Q-Games’ achievement in acquiring the rights to The Tomorrow Children even more impressive. It’s exciting to see what this development will mean not just for The Tomorrow Children, but for other inactive Sony titles as well.

Daniel Robson is the editor-in-chief of IGN Japan. For full disclosure, he worked at SIE Japan Studio while The Tomorrow Children was in development, but did not work directly on creating the project. He is also a fan of the game. Follow him on Twitter here.