Fresh off a fantastic Quake 2 remaster, Nightdive would once again like Tim Sweeney to know it's ready and eager to do the same to Unreal
The studio has Cliff Bleszinski's backing, too.
Friends, I have a confession to make. You might have seen one or two stories on our website about Baldur's Gate 3, an overall pretty solid RPG that practically everyone on staff here has been pouring hours and days of their lives into. But not me. I've been distracted by another venerable series, a contemporary of the original Baldur's Gate games and the first game I ever remember laying my hands on. I've been playing Quake 2.
Nightdive's Quake 2 remaster, to be specific—an incredibly thorough and caring touch-up of the original id game from 1997, and the follow-up to the studio's equally excellent Quake 1 remaster from 2021. It's fantastic, and—unsurprisingly—Nightdive has no intention of stopping there. Over on Twitter (X, whatever), studio CEO Stephen Kick is (once again) angling for Epic to let him give Unreal the same treatment.
After our Quake Remaster @therealcliffyb reached out to @TimSweeneyEpic on our behalf hoping we could give Unreal the same treatment...and I guess if you want that leave a message to let Tim know ???? https://t.co/nM1KInSNvIJune 4, 2022
Kick's tweet came after former Unreal designer Cliff Bleszinski jokingly lamented the absence of an Unreal remaster in the wake of Nightdive's work on Quake 1 and 2. Kick was right in there, tweeting at Epic boss Tim Sweeney that Nightdive would "be honored to be the caretakers of Unreal, you've seen what we've done with Doom & Quake, it'd be in good hands".
It sounds like an excellent idea to me, but we probably shouldn't hold our breath. Kick prefaced that tweet with an acknowledgement that Bleszinski had "stuck his neck out" for Nightdive in the past, a reference to Bleszinski's attempt to get Sweeney to let Nightdive take a shot at Unreal a few years ago. It doesn't seem like the Epic boss agreed, though, given that Kick is still tweeting about the matter in 2023.
But we can at least take heart that Nightdive doesn't seem likely to let the matter lie. Kick last made noises about remastering Unreal after Nightdive's Quake 1 remaster released in 2021, and now he's back—as if he has a reminder set up on his phone—to prod Sweeney again with the Quake 2 remaster fresh in everyone's memory. I really hope Epic caves eventually, but if not, well, Kick will remind the company a week or two after Quake 3 remastered, I guess.