Here’s where it gets potentially confusing: Microsoft doesn’t own Crystal Dynamics — that studio belongs to the Embracer Group, which has had many troubles of its own. So Embracer was trying to cut a deal with yet another publisher, the giant Take-Two, to buy, fund, and publish the game. But, Schreier reports:

the talks collapsed at least in part because the companies involved were unable to come to terms over long-term ownership of the Perfect Dark franchise, said the people, who requested anonymity because they were not authorized to speak about sensitive negotiations.

When that deal fell through, it reportedly led to the new round of layoffs at Crystal Dynamics that IGN reported last week, and Schreier writes that Crystal Dynamics has now “fully” abandoned the game.

Seems Microsoft didn’t want to give up the rights to Perfect Dark, which it presumably obtained when it bought Rare in 2002. (For the uninitiated, Perfect Dark was a spiritual successor to Rare’s hit Goldeneye 007 on the Nintendo 64, a game that itself went many decades without a revival because of a complicated licensing situation.) That feels like a crummy reason for the game to stay canceled, but we don’t know the details.