‘Fez II’ abruptly canceled after developer Phil Fish explodes in rage on Twitter

Phil Fish, the creator of celebrated indie video game Fez, is notorious for voicing angry, controversial opinions about the state of video games and their development. Today, however, he seems to have ragequit on the entire video gaming community, and has taken the sequel to Fez down with him. On his Twitter account and on developer Polytron’s website, Fish has announced that Fez II has been canceled.

Polygon and Joystiq both independently confirmed with Fish that it’s not a joke: the game is no more. Developer Polytron also confirmed the cancellation in a tweet to its followers, writing “we apologize for the disappointment.”

What happened? It’s not clear, and Fish writes that it “isn’t the result of any one thing,” but the game’s cancellation did come at the end of an unprecedented tussle on Twitter. GameTrailers host Marcus “AnnoyedGamer” Beer and Fish got into an argument after Beer called Fish a “hipster,” a “tosspot,” a “wanker” and a “fucking asshole” on yesterday’s episode of Invisible Walls, a GameTrailers video podcast, after Fish refused to answer questions about Microsoft’s decision to allow indie developers to self-publish on Xbox One. Fish then lashed out at Beer, claiming that the GameTrailers host had assassinated his character, telling Beer to “compare your life to mine and then kill yourself,” and asking him to apologize on camera.

The argument culminated with Fish writing “im done. FEZ II is canceled. goodbye,” and locking his Twitter account.