"Canceled Twisted Metal Game Blended Vehicular Combat, Shooting, and Battle Royale, Developer Reveals"

Brand new images of Sony's canceled Twisted Metal game have surfaced online, revealing that developer Firesprite was working on a live service game that combined the franchise's iconic vehicular combat with battle royale mechanics. A former UI developer at Sony-owned Firesprite shared a series of screenshots on their online portfolio. Although the images are deliberately blurred and marked "Under NDA," they fall under the codename Project Copper, believed to be the internal designation for the unannounced live-service Twisted Metal game.

Twisted Metal, a vehicle combat video game series that originated on the PSone and last saw a release during the PlayStation 3 era, was being reimagined by Firesprite as a "third-person vehicular action combat game based on a classic IP owned by PlayStation." The developer described Project Copper as featuring "third-person shooter mechanics wrapped with third-person vehicle combat," with the goal of being the last player standing, according to MP1st.

Sony canceled Twisted Metal as part of widespread layoffs announced in February 2024. At the time, the game was still in development at UK studio Firesprite and had not yet been officially greenlit, but was impacted by the cuts.

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100 ImagesTwisted Metal was shelved amid Sony's broader retreat from live service games, following an intense internal effort to produce more of these titles. Naughty Dog ceased development on The Last of Us Online in December 2023, citing the need to dedicate all resources to post-launch content for years, which would have significantly hindered their ability to create future single-player games.

While Arrowhead's Helldivers 2 became a massive success, selling 12 million copies in just 12 weeks and becoming the fastest-selling PlayStation Studios game ever, Sony's live service hero shooter Concord was a notable failure. It lasted only a few weeks before being taken offline due to extremely low player counts, eventually leading Sony to terminate the game and shut down its developer.

In January, Sony also canceled two other unannounced live service games: one being a God of War title developed by Bluepoint, and another at Days Gone developer Bend.

Although it seems unlikely that we'll see a new Twisted Metal game in the near future, the Twisted Metal TV series starring Anthony Mackie is set to return for Season 2 on Peacock. IGN's review of Twisted Metal Season 1 awarded it an 8/10, stating, "Though overloaded with jokes at times, Twisted Metal is a miraculously enjoyable blend of comedy, violence, and thoughtfulness."