The already obsolete graphics of The Last Guardian as seen in an E3 announcement trailer

Team Ico, the developer behind the critically acclaimed games Ico and Shadow of the Colossus, has been working on The Last Guardian for nearly eight years, but despite the game possibly being stuck in development hell, Sony Computer Entertainment was quick to deny rumors that the project had been abandoned.

The rumors started to spread yesterday when it was discovered that Sony had let the trademark for the game’s name expire…again. The game had originally been scheduled to release on the PlayStation 3 in 2011, but the game was delayed again and again. Now, after nearly 10 years since the last release of a Team Ico game, there is still no end in sight for The Last Guardian.

But Sony wasted no time in assuring gamers that the project is still moving forward, and the trademark expiration was not a sign that the game had been abandoned. Sony released a statement saying that the loss of the trademark was due to an administrative error. This would not be the first time the trademark had expired due to an oversight, as Sony previously failed to renew the title of the game in 2012.

Why the long wait?

The extreme delay in the game’s release has led to many gamers calling to The Last Guardian as vaporware,which refers to software that is announced to the public but never actually released.

With video games, vaporware can sometimes be the result of developers constantly adding new features and eventually scrapping large portions of the game when they become obsolete.

The most notorious example of this in gaming was the 15-year development cycle of 3D Realms’ Duke Nukem Forever. The unending development of the game became something of a running joke in the gaming community, and there were even websites dedicated to listing everything that had happened in the time since the game was announced, including the creating of broadband internet, the entire Grand Theft Auto series through GTA IV, and the birth and death of MySpace.

Despite Sony’s assurances that The Last Guardian has not been cancelled, gamers remain skeptical that the title will ever see the light of day.

Screenshot via TGN Army/YouTube