The Midnight Club series of racing games, which marked a generation in the days of the PlayStation 2, almost had its fifth release. In a recent interview, Kris Roberts, former senior designer at Rockstar, revealed that Midnight Club 5 was developed, but the project ended up being discontinued before being officially announced.
Roberts explained that the team was already immersed in creating prototypes for the new game, which would include an early version of the city of London as one of the settings. However, development did not progress as expected and was halted mid-production.
The former developer also commented that the franchise gradually lost relevance within Rockstar itself. The company directed its resources and attention to other of its most established series, such as Grand Theft Auto and Red Dead Redemption, leaving the acclaimed Midnight Club saga without a sequel.
Internal conflicts at Rockstar led to the end of Midnight Club 5
During his appearance on the Kiwi Talkz program, Roberts shared that work on Midnight Club 5 continued even after his departure from the developer. “They were starting Midnight Club 5, or whatever they were going to call the game, but it didn’t last and it was cancelled,” he said.
According to Roberts, one of the deciding factors for the cancellation was a “considerable conflict” between Rockstar’s divisions in New York and San Diego, which was responsible for the franchise. He detailed that some of these tensions arose from deadline delays during the production of Midnight Club: Los Angeles.
The former designer hypothesized that the dispute was not just restricted to delays. “I think it also had to do with creative control. We felt that, in any other studio, Midnight Club would be a solid game”, he declared, indicating deeper differences.
Although there are already sketches and plans for new cities, vehicles and several other features, the sequence was shelved before any official announcement was made, generating frustration among fans.
Midnight Club series was played more than competitors, but was discontinued
Roberts mentioned that Midnight Club managed to keep its players engaged longer than major rival titles, such as Need for Speed and Burnout. However, this performance was not enough to guarantee the continuity of the franchise within Rockstar.
For him, the team realized that the effort dedicated to the game never received the recognition it deserved internally. “The perception was, ‘You’re not from GTA’. We were treated as inferior, even though we were delivering a world-class game,” said Roberts.
After the decision to cancel Midnight Club 5, the development team was disbanded. Some members were transferred to other company projects, such as the RAGE graphics engine and Red Dead Redemption, while others chose to leave Rockstar.
“When they canceled the series, it was very clear that there would be no more Midnight Club and that everything from then on would be GTA and projects like that”, recalled Roberts in the interview, marking the end of an era.
Is there any hope for a new game in the Midnight Club franchise?
So far, Rockstar Games has given no indication that it plans to revive the Midnight Club franchise. The studio remains fully focused on the development of Grand Theft Auto 6 and continued support for the popular GTA Online.
Furthermore, other projects that often appear in rumors and are highly anticipated by fans, such as Bully 2 and a possible Red Dead Redemption 3, also appear as priorities before any eventual return of the urban racing series.
Given this scenario, the chances of a new Midnight Club title reaching current generation consoles seem quite slim. Rockstar, however, never made an official announcement about the definitive closure of the franchise.
