Evolve Developer No Longer Working on the Game

Evolve developer Turtle Rock is saying goodbye to the game. The studio announced that today, October 25, is the last day that the developer is able to work on the 4v1 monster-hunting game.

"It's always hard to leave one of our games behind. Left 4 Dead was no different and now it's Evolve's turn," reads a line from a note written by Turtle Rock founders Chris Ashton and Phil Robb. "There will always be a special place in our hearts for our past projects. No matter what happens with Evolve in the future, we'll know it was born in this studio and developed by this team alongside this beautiful community."

Turtle Rock does not own the Evolve franchise. Grand Theft Auto and Red Dead parent company Take-Two does, having paid $10.89 million to buy the franchise during THQ's bankruptcy auction. Turtle Rock itself bid on the franchise, but its offer of $250,000 was not nearly enough.

"This is the life of AAA game developers who aren't self-funded and don't own their own IP," the statement from Ashton and Robb goes on to say. "We don't get to make the call. We all know that going in but we still sign the dotted line because we love what we do. We are happy to have gotten the opportunity to do something risky, something new and innovative. We created a brand new sci-fi world. We got to go to planet Shear and interact with alien flora and fauna. We got to hunt down, trap and kill giant monsters together. We got to BE the monster. What an awesome experience."

Turtle Rock will hold a livestream to say goodbye to Evolve on Thursday, October 27, starting at 12 PM PT through its Twitch account. "We'll be there talking about our experience on the project and answering as many of your questions as we can," Ashton and Robb said.

The developers teased that "this is not goodbye," as Turtle Rock has "lots of stuff in the works."

"We'll see you all again, another time on another world….," they said.

Evolve continues to be available, with development shifting to 2K's in-house team. A blog post from 2K explains that console versions of Evolve's free-to-play edition are still under consideration, though the "focus is on bringing in new players and maintaining the game’s audience on PC."

No more updates for Evolve are planned.

Take-Two has described Evolve as a "permanent" franchise alongside GTA and Red Dead, so there may be more games to come in the future. CEO Strauss Zelnick said the game might have been too multiplayer-focused, suggesting a follow-up could have more in the area of single-player. He also said Evolve is a "key long-term franchise" for Take-Two.

Evolve has shipped more than 2.5 million copies. The game adopted a free-to-play business model earlier this year, which led to a massive surge in players.

Earlier this month, Turtle Rock announced a virtual reality game called Face Your Fears.