In a Polygon interview with Level-5 CEO Akihiro Hino at Gamescom, the leader of one of Japan’s most popular development studios is quoted as saying that, in terms of the possibility of there being a Dark Cloud 3 developed for current generation hardware, the franchise’s fate lies with publisher Sony Computer Entertainment.
“There has been a lot of requests and voices to create a Dark Cloud 3 or some form of Dark Cloud. That IP is co-owned or managed by Sony, so it’s not something that we can do or act upon on our own.”
Though the man is still interested in creating a third entry in the series and has even talked with Sony about it in the past, Hino went on to mention in the interview that he’s “not sure if that’s happening now.”
Unfortunate as this may be, the possibility of early Professor Layton games making their way to current consoles is much more likely, seeing as how everything developed from Layton on is wholly owned by the studio. Though the franchise may not have the same nostalgia value as Dark Cloud, remasters or ports of Professor Layton’s first titles could help tide the wait for more Level-5 goodness, or at least until subsequent Ni No Kuni games release.
Having enjoyed great critical and sales success in North America, the first two Dark Cloud titles were some of the first games to join PlayStation 4’s PlayStation 2 emulation library back in fall of 2015. Though Sony has kept very quiet about the franchise for years now, here’s hoping that internal talks will begin soon.
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