StarCraft: Ghost concept art surfaces, game hasn't

StarCraft: Ghost was originally poised to be a direct competitor to the Splinter Cell and Metal Gear franchises, with similar action and stealth gameplay. Set four years after the events of StarCraft: The Brood War, it was once a hotly anticipated title for Blizzard fans. Yet, the game has eluded retail shelves after years of delays and swapped hands.

A gaggle of concept art is now available online of what once was Sam Fisher and Solid Snake's worst nightmare... a girl! For a little back story on the StarCraft: Ghost insanity, here is your daily history lesson:

2002 - StarCraft: Ghost is announced (at TGS), under the development eye of Nihilistic Software (of Conan fame)
2004 - Numerous delays forced Nihilistic to cede development duties to Swingin' Ape Studios (makers of Metal Arms: Glitch in the System)
2005 - A GameCube version of SG is officially canned and Blizzard decides to hold off on further development to assess the upcoming generation of consoles
Mid 2006 - StarCraft: Ghost is put on 'indefinite hold' by Blizzard, who has since moved on to StarCraft 2 development
Late 2006 - StarCraft Ghost: Nova was released in bookstores setting up the back story for the (now likely) vaporware title
2008 - Blizzard does not include Ghost in a presentation at D.I.C.E. referencing canceled games; Blizzard claims it was never officially canceled
2009 - Yeah, the game still doesn't exist

Reader Comments (44)

to an extent i do. it had great potential and they even had some gameplay videos, it looked great for its time.

however, im not anticipating it being released, i got my hopes up far too many times to just get let down.

Hopefully this won't become the next Duke Nukem Forever.

The project got canceled.

I care, I was very very sad when it was all but canceled.

I was excited to buy this for my new PS2. I love the Starcraft universe, and wanted as much material from it as possible. Nearly 10 years have passed since I've had any new story elements.

To put it lightly, yes I freaking care.

*Does* anyone care? Of course not.

*Did*? In 2002? Care about a game in the Starcraft universe? A stealth action game with a hottie lead? Before Splinter Cell 1 had even come out? You're damn right we did.

It would have been awesome if this game came out. It had potential to be great. Also the StarCraft universe is interesting enough to warrant this.

I wanted this game so bad... thanks for bringing those feelings back. I hope they still release this game (improved, and not outdated of course).

I never liked the look of the main character of this game. She was just too "I'm such a hot blonde with big tits who can do cool shit" for me.

Compared to the females you see in games these days, she's very tame. Probably too tame for some of the gaming community. They would need to probably cut down her cloth-to-skin ratio by a half and increase the size of her boobs.

you have something against blondes with big tits?

Starbuck is that you?

Big difference between the two. Nova's a chick.

Zing!

If this game ever came out it would've easily been in my top favorites of all time. But no, Blizzard had to crush my dreams.

*black liquid sorrow tears*

My friend refuses to take Gamestop's attempts to get him to take back his preorder, to this day, which he preordered like, 7 years ago when this was first announced.

maybe we'l hear something at blizzcon or the world wide invitational.

*crosses fingers*

See, normally I would say "don't hold your breath" but I've been holding mine since I read about the announcement in GameInformer all those years ago

Blizzard has always been about making great games (gameplay, visuals, and story), not moderate games with cheap marketing crap like this would've been. No one would have taken this game seriously since it's obviously another game that just uses its female lead to sell. Blizzard is too good for that.

If this game does come to be, please let it be after this generation.

Approximately 693 Koreans just had heart palpitations.

Approximately 254 Koreans just had heart attacks.

Approximately 57 Koreans just had a stroke.

Approximately 5617 Koreans just had acute and severe diarrhoea.

Approximately 20% of those were fatal.

Approximately 95% of Koreans can still justify these concept art images as being awesome.

I don't think Koreans would be very interested in a console-only third-person shooter, even if it does have the StarCraft name.

Copypasta from something that was more relevant I'm guessing.

No copypasta. I wouldn't stoop so low. Though I'm still expecting to be downvoted by assuming that the name Starcraft was enough for South Korea's interest to be piqued.

... wut?

Approximately 78.429% of all statistics are made up on the spot.

Shall we also calculate the expected value, variance, and standard deviation?

None of these are new...
http://media.ps2.ign.com/media/489/489843/imgs_1.html

I always thought it looked awesome, and was really disappointed when the GC version got cancelled... I thought it had been officially canned, though it kinda makes sense to save it until near/after the release of Starcraft 2 if they are still working on it... Hmmmmm...

I cared. I bought the book, but there's no game to go with it ;_;

It looked okay. I got to play around with it at an E3. The reason they canned it was because it was just okay. Hats off to blizzard; if a game isn't ZOMGMYBRAINZISONFIRE it gets canned. Any company with that much production integrity... damn.

Just ::smacking veiny arm:: wish ::full of track marks:: I could quit their games!

Damn, now I really, really want this game to be leaked, just like Half-Life for Dreamcast.

;_;

Definitely, Blizzard are one of the last uncompromising devs out there. Too bad they had to merge with Activision.

I played an early build of it at the first Blizzcon. At that stage it was just a class based (as I recall, I remember there being Firebats and Hydralisks that you could play) Halo death-match clone. No sign of the single player game. It was supremely generic, which isn't too unusual for a carefully limited beta build of a game, but still, it didn't look like it was going anywhere good.

I remember playing some beta multiplayer at E3 in 2005. It wasn't that great, just like you said.

And this is the chick that sets up the nuclear launch, oooooo kkkkkk, dont really care, it seems like it would be a Halo ODST type title.

A few years ago, I decided I wouldn't play another Blizzard game until this came out.

And I haven't.
And I won't

Staying away from WoW is the best decision I've ever made.

This was the reason I stayed interested in this game.

http://gamerhistory.com/images/Ghost/nova2cut.jpg

Enough said.

One of my 3D teachers at school used to work on Starcraft Ghost: he actually has some artwork from it on his website. Enjoy. =)

http://www.digitalenvi.com/

I'm glad they haven't closed the door on the possibility, it was a solid concept.

Yah, it would've been nice if this had come out.

Ah, Ghost.
I remember the gameplay footage where the Ghost painted a bunch of Dragoons and have Siege Tanks rain hell on them. That was EPIC! I was really looking forward to seeing those Dragoons walk around and clashing with Ultralisks.. but alas, the game never surfaced.
All in the name of quality. I don't know whether I love or hate Bliz's strictness with its releases.

There is a grave marker in outland for this title. Need a flying mount to get to it, but that pretty much seals it that the game is dead.

they better turn the Ghost project into a World of Starcraft cuz i am so sick of WoW where everything is almost turn-based and its boring as crap =(

StarCraft: Ghost concept art surfaces, game hasn't

Reader Comments (44)

Posted: Mar 17th 2009 8:08PM isOmetriC said

Posted: Mar 18th 2009 12:16PM (Unverified) said

Posted: Mar 18th 2009 8:25PM ThornedVenom said

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Posted: Mar 17th 2009 8:21PM Michelobius said

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Posted: Mar 17th 2009 8:24PM Discotheque said

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Posted: Mar 17th 2009 8:28PM Discotheque said

Posted: Mar 18th 2009 7:02AM Ghen said

Posted: Mar 17th 2009 8:26PM Discotheque said

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Posted: Mar 18th 2009 7:45AM Temidien said

Posted: Mar 17th 2009 8:35PM Nytemare said

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Posted: Mar 17th 2009 8:44PM timstew said

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