CCP cancel Project Nova, but haven't given up on an EVE Online shooter

Another EVE Online spin-off has bitten the dust. Project Nova, CCP's latest attempt to put their expansive universe in front of the barrel of a rifle, has joined Dust 514 and EVE: Valkyrie on the intergalactic scrapheap. The devs haven't quite given up on a boots-on-the-ground galaxy entirely. They've still got a team down in London plugging away at that problem. But for all intents and purposes, Nova is no more.

According to Massively, CCP owner Pearl Abyss formally announced Nova's cancellation in their Q4 earnings report. CCP took to Reddit to elaborate, noting that the dream of an EVE Online FPS isn't quite dead - it had simply grown beyond what Nova was meant to be.

"This decision was taken because Project Nova’s gameplay experience as presented at EVE Vegas '18 would not have achieved our ambitious goals for this concept. Moreover, it is very common for games in active development to evolve over time, often substantially. We remain committed to offering a rock-solid, action-oriented gameplay experience with stellar visuals, but due to significant changes in the scope and direction of our sci-fi multiplayer shooter game concept, it also made sense to update how we refer to this project internally. So, we are no longer using the codename Project Nova for this game concept."

A "sci-fi multiplayer shooter" is still in development at CCP London, mind. In fact, that office has been moved over entirely to developing and exploring that concept. But the spaceship-maker's home in Reykjavik is no longer involved, moving back onto other projects. As an aside, CCP are also gonna stop posting publically whenever they get really excited about a pet project.

"We are moving away from publicly announcing our internal project codenames and will wait until we’re ready for a full reveal. We want to show you rather than tell you how we have evolved this concept and we’re looking forward to doing so when the time comes to present this concept as a fully-fledged game."

As a fellow creative, I get it. It's real easy to get pumped up about something you're working on, zealously oversharing cool screens before the whole thing fizzles out. It's a bad feeling, and while this probably means we won't see so many musings come out of the Icelandic developers, what we do see is more likely to have legs.

For what it's worth, Project Nova wasn't exactly shaping up to be an all-time great. Steven Messner warped out to Fanfest 2016 to give it a shot, but found little more than "another generic sci-fi shooter".

It wasn't even much of a shake against the last EVE shooter, Dust 514. That game might've been janky, technically flawed, and a PlayStation exclusive - but at least us PC lot could rock up to a match with a nation-sized warship. As it should be, really.