SEGA cancels Creative Assembly’s multiplayer sci-fi shooter HYENAS

Say goodbye to Creative Assembly’s Hyenas hero shooter

SEGA has officially announced that they have cancelled Hyenas, Creative Assembly’s sci-fi hero shooter. As part of their press release on the subject, SEGA has also confirmed the cancellation of several other unannounced games, citing “lower profitability of the European region”.

In Hyenas, players are expected to team up with their “pack” and steal priceless pop culture loot. Packs can then get extracted once they have gathered enough merch. The game is a “hero shooter” style of game, which appears to also have battle royale elements.

While it is sad to see that Creative Assembly’s Hyenas has been cancelled, it is hard to see the game being a success. The “hero shooter” market is already filled with popular games, and it is hard to imagine SEGA finding success against competitors like Apex Legends and Overwatch 2. We have already seen Ubisoft fail to succeed in this market with Hyper Scape. We have also seen Ninja Theory’s Bleeding Edge fail to gain traction in recent years.

Creative Assembly are best known for their Total War series. The studio will be releasing Total War: Pharoah in October 2023. The studio has a long DLC roadmap for Total War: Warhammer III. SEGA’s cancellation of Hyenas will likely help Creative Assembly to focus on their core titles, and allow them to allocate more resources to the Total War series.

HYENAS is a hero-based, multiplayer extraction shooter. Choose a Hyena to play as – each with a unique weapon, ability, and personality – to form a crew of three and steal valuable Merch. The action takes place on vast, themed ‘Plunderships’ returning to Mars from Earth, loaded with salvaged Merch for your crew to steal.

Competing with four other raiding crews, your goal is to find and crack secured vaults, then steal enough Merch to make your escape. Standing in your way are not only rival players but also the “MURFs” – security forces who will fight to the death to protect the precious cargo.

Once a team has stolen enough Merch, they activate the Plundership’s VIP Extraction, which is revealed on the map. You must find it and make your getaway or stop others from making theirs. The crew that escapes first is the winner, so make sure it’s you!

Below is what SEGA had to say about the game’s cancellation. This statement confirms the cancellation of HYENAS and other unannounced games.

In response to the lower profitability of the European region, we have reviewed the title portfolio of each development base in Europe and the resulting action will be to cancel “HYENAS” and some unannounced titles under development.

Currently, it is unknown what, or how many, other games have been cancelled by SEGA. It is also unclear if any of these other projects are related to Creative Assembly.

You can join the discussion on SEGA cancelling HYENAS on the OC3D Forums.