In-Engine Footage for Zenimax Online’s ‘Project Blackbird’ Has Appeared Online

Whoops? Looks like footage for Zenimax Online’s thoroughly cancelled ‘Project Blackbird’ has appeared online over the weekend, sparking fresh sorrow – we’ll never get to play it.

The footage was shared by eXtas1s on Twitter, and following the tweet going live, Insider Gaming’s Tom Henderson verified that it is indeed in-engine, saying “I can independently verify the footage is real.“

Now admittedly, the footage doesn’t show much beyond a couple of minutes of a sci-fi urban environment, full of neon lights, alien races and cool futuristic monorails. It’s all very atmospheric. The game, which was only ever referred to as ‘Project Blackbird’ was cancelled last year as a part of Microsoft’s broad sweeping layoffs, that also saw us wave goodbye to game studio ‘The Initiative’ and the reboot of Perfect Dark and Rare’s Everwild. Project Blackbird apparently impressed executives at Xbox, and it had been in development since 2018 – but that wasn’t enough to save it.

Following the cancellation, Zenimax Online Founder Matt Frior left the company, describing Project Blackbird as a title he’d waited his “entire career to create”.

Do you think this brief glimpse of Project Blackbird impresses? Let us know in the XboxEra Forums or make some noise in the lively XboxEra Community Discord Server. If you’re looking to be a bigger part of an amazing community, then either choice is a good one!