The Fate Of PlayStation 3 Exclusive Agent Has Finally Been Revealed

Agent
(Image credit: Take-Two Interactive)

For years, and years, and years, gamers wondered what would become of the supposed PlayStation 3 exclusive, Agent. It was a game that some assumed would have great promise being developed by Rockstar Games, but after years of silence the fate of this long-awaited game has finally been revealed. It's dead.

DualShockers is reporting that Rockstar Games' parent company, Take-Two Interactive, has abandoned the trademark for Agent. As noted in the piece, the trademark was continually renewed for the game over the years just up until recently, where Take-Two decided to call it quits and abandon the trademark with the United States Patent and Trademark Office.

Over on the official USPTO page for Agent, it shows the last time it was renewed as well as when the trademark was abandoned, noting that the last filing date was back on December 5th, 2016. It was noted that back on February 21st, 2017 the trademark was re-approved, but as of November 19th, 2018 the trademark had become abandoned because the USPTO never received a response or statement of extension from Take-Two Interactive.

Essentially, the publisher just gave up on the trademark for Agent have years of renewal. However, this doesn't mean that the publisher was actually funding a game in between that time or that development was even taking place. Sometimes parent companies keep a trademark alive in case it decides to either finish and release a product, or sell it off for continuation elsewhere. In this case, Take-Two seems to have just given up on the game altogether after more than a decade of fans waiting for the game's release.

Rockstar Games initially announced the stealth-action title way back in 2007 as a PlayStation 3 exclusive. It would take another two years before the game would be formally announced at E3, where it was revealed that the game would be a Cold War-era stealth-espionage title, not unlike Metal Gear Solid.

Rockstar North was initially working on the game, which was supposed to be a globetrotting adventure set during the late 1970s, where players took control of an agent attempting to uncover a shadowy conspiracy taking place within phantom organizations and deep state agencies.

Obviously it's the sort of concept one would expect from a Cold War-era style game, and probably would have gone on to become -- at the very least -- a cult classic, much like Obsidian's Alpha Protocol.

However, instead of getting to see the game in action in any capacity, or receiving any kind of update on the game, the only thing that happened was that we would occasionally find out that Take-Two Interactive would renew the trademark for Agent, but then nothing else of significance would pop up.

Unlike other games stuck in development hell such as The Last Guardian or Duke Nukem Forever, Rockstar's Agent never rebounded and proved the critics wrong, and now it appears as if Take-Two is wiping its hands clean of the game for good.

Will Usher

Staff Writer at CinemaBlend.