While 2025 has been marked by the release of exceptional games, some of which have enjoyed unexpected success, it has also seen a number of cancellations and studio closures. The Initiative and its reboot of Perfect Dark have unfortunately fallen into this category.
In an interview with TheGamer, Alix Wilton Regan, who was set to play Joanna Dark in the game (and who will be Lara Croft in the upcoming Tomb Raider games), opened up about the cancellation. Upon hearing the news, the actress said she was surprised, shocked and even devastated.
“I was as shocked, surprised, and devastated as everyone else was when the funding was pulled, and the studio was closed. I did not see it coming. I was absolutely blindsided when the project was defunded.”
She also discussed the voice recording sessions for Perfect Dark. According to her, the work was well underway on that front.
“We were basically recording bits and bobs throughout ’23. We were also doing lots of performance capture for it in ’24, and we were even recording more stuff for it in ’25. To my knowledge, we were pretty far along. I’d done entire chapters of this universe […].”
“We had delivered several milestones that the client [Microsoft] was really happy with.”
Finally, she revealed that The Initiative tried to save Perfect Dark until the very last moment. A “slimmed down” version of the game had even been proposed, but Microsoft apparently rejected the idea.
“I couldn’t say too much about it because I knew The Initiative was in talks to keep Perfect Dark up and running in some shape or form. Possibly a slimmed-down version, possibly something slightly different. But certainly, everyone was working really hard behind the scenes to bring Perfect Dark back. And then one day, I heard from the creative director that the deal hadn’t gone through, and that really everything had fallen apart, and production was fully stopping.”
