Xbox has officially pulled the plug on Contraband, a cooperative open-world game that was in development at Avalanche Studios since 2021. The cancellation comes after nearly four years of complete radio silence, with no gameplay footage, screenshots, or substantial updates ever shared with the public after its initial announcement.
Contraband was first revealed during the Xbox & Bethesda Games Showcase in June 2021 with nothing more than a brief teaser trailer showing a logo. The game was pitched as a 1970s-themed co-op heist adventure set in a fictional world called “Bayan,” promising to leverage Avalanche’s expertise in open-world action games.
Avalanche Studios, the team behind the Just Cause series and Mad Max, confirmed the cancellation on their website, stating: “Active development has now stopped while we evaluate the project’s future. We’re thankful for the excitement we’ve seen from the community since we announced and will give an update on what’s next as soon as we can.”
The wording of Avalanche’s statement makes it sound like the studio could try to shop the concept to another publisher, though industry experts are doubtful that’ll go anywhere after years of slow progress.
The cancellation is part of a bigger wave of cuts at Xbox, which recently laid off hundreds of employees and shut down several studios. Other high-profile Xbox projects have also been canceled in recent weeks as Microsoft seems to be rethinking its game lineup and what it wants its teams to focus on.
This whole thing just shows how common it is for games to be announced way too early, often years before anyone can actually see anything new. Xbox especially gets called out for this—just look at the long waits and long silences after announcing games like the Perfect Dark reboot, Everwild, and Fable.
What makes Contraband‘s story stand out is that even after four years, we never got a single glimpse of gameplay or really any solid details. As one commenter put it: “If there’s nothing to show but a logo after four years, it’s probably time to shut it down.”
Even though Contraband is gone, Xbox still has some big games on the horizon, including new entries in well-known series and brand-new games like Clockwork Revolution. But the growing list of canceled projects has people wondering what’s going on with how Xbox handles its development teams and keeps projects on track.
