Denis Dyack’s Precursor Games ‘taking a break’ after failures to fund first game

After two failed Kickstarter attempts to fund its first project, Precursor Games has broken up.

The company housed several members of Silicon Knights, a studio best remembered for the GameCube’s Eternal Darkness before legal problems and disappointing games like Too Human and X-Men: Destiny severely hurt its reputation. Denis Dyack, formerly Silicon Knights’ president, served as Precursor Game’s chief creative officer.

Precursor Games attempted to crowdfund a spiritual successor to Eternal Darkness, called Shadow of the Eternals, first on its own website and then on Kickstarter. It originally asked for $1.5 million, but it cancelled the campaign and soon relaunched with a smaller $750,000 goal. It only raised $323,950.

“Many of us will be taking a break,” Dyack posted on the company’s forums (as first spotted by Eurogamer). “For those who are not aware, we all worked on this project as a labor of love and self-financed 100 percent of everything for over a year to try to make Shadow of the Eternals a reality. Although we did not succeed on doing this, we succeeded in making many friends and starting something that we hope provided value for those involved. We have no regrets.”

Still, Dyack refuses to bury Shadow of the Eternals. “Is the project dead?” he wrote in his message. “No, but we feel it needs a rest too. We have all agreed as a group that when and if the time is right we will get together and start it up again.”