An actress who was seemingly cast in the now-canceled Prince of Persia: The Sands of Time remake only found out the game was no longer in development when her brother spotted the reaction on the internet.
As part of a “major reset” for the company, six games were recently canceled by Ubisoft. One of these was the remake of the iconic platformer Prince of Persia: The Sands of Time from 2003, which itself was a reboot of the series.
As you’d expect, fans were pretty disappointed to hear the project would never see the light of day, after originally being scheduled to release in 2021.
Those working on the game were also hit hard by the news, and one actress has explained that she found out after the rest of the world.
Prince of Persia remake actress discusses “devastating” cancellation
In an upload to her YouTube channel, actress Eman Ayaz, who had an unspecified role in The Sands of Time remake, discussed the “grief” she feels over the cancellation, calling it the “most devastating moment of my career.”
Although she couldn’t officially name what she was working on, the timing and context make it pretty clear she was talking about Prince of Persia.
“Three years ago, I booked a life-changing role on a life-changing project,” she explains in the video. “It was a rigorous audition process, including a self-tape audition, an in-person callback, and a chemistry read that I had to fly out of the city for. When I got the role, I remember crying my eyes out.”
“I’ve spent the last three years getting to know the team, which has become like a family to me. I’ve watched it grow through countless stages of development, and I’ve waited and waited for it to finally be released so I could talk about it. And this week, I found out through the internet that the project was canceled.”
According to Ayaz, she wasn’t informed by Ubisoft about the cancellation; instead, she was sent a WhatsApp message from her brother asking if she was handling the news. When she replied with a confused response, he then sent her a link to a news article revealing it had been scrapped.
“I was in total shock,” she continues. “Just two months ago, I filmed marketing for this project; everything had been running smoothly, and that was the last I had heard. We were all looking forward to it being released this year, so it felt like an emotional whiplash to suddenly find this out in such a random way.”
Although Eman Ayaz remained fairly upbeat throughout the video, she also revealed that she can legally no longer use her work on the Prince of Persia remake in future showreels to help her land new roles.
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