American McGee Caves and Announces Plans for Alice 3

American McGee Alice is Returning… again!

American McGee is to gaming what Terry Gillian is to movies. Nobody disputes his work is amazing, it just generally has one problem, it doesn’t make much money. When the initial Alice game was released in 2000, it was met with critical acclaim. Unfortunately, luke-warm sales figures meant that for a long time, many thought it was just a one-off. Fans were therefore delighted when in 2011 a sequel, Alice: Madness Returns, was released. Similar to the 1st, it was a very impressive game. Particularly the visuals which were as if Salvador Dali and H.P. Lovecraft had gone into collaboration. Sadly, similar to the first game, sales figures fell heavily into the ‘ok, but not great’ category. This created doubts as to whether we would ever see a 3rd instalment.

American McGee has said on several occasions since 2011, he is sick and tired of being asked about a third game.  Well, he’s finally, after probably the millionth time, caved in and admitted, there will (maybe) be a 3rd Alice game.

This might not be an announcement on the scale of Final Fantasy XV for the PC, but I’ll take it!

What can we expect in this new game?

A level of insanity befitting the Mad-Hatter who, after a week, has still not taken his pills. Following the announcement via PCGamesN, there is a small fly to put in this ointment. Firstly, American McGee has only announced that he has a concept. This is not in development and at present is nowhere near.

Usually, at this stage, it is for the creator to make a ‘proof of concept’ then pitch it to developers or publishers to try to get someone to bite. The problem is that, as aforementioned, the previous games in this series did ok, but not fantastically at the cash register. Therefore, you are probably going to struggle to find someone who is racing to develop this. With the previous 2 games published by EA, that does help, but it’s still got a long way to go.

What may help is that American McGee recently got a card game through Kickstarter and as such, with some good experience, he may look to reuse this medium. It also would suit this title, which similar to Shenmui, has a small, but vocal fanbase.

That being said, the good news is that it’s at least no longer a dream. Provisionally titled ‘Alice: Asylum’, we look forward to more news from American McGee in the future.