Todd Howard confirms Marvel's Blade is still alive, says Arkane is doing 'a really, really great job'

Bethesda boss Todd Howard has broken the long silence on Marvel's Blade, confirming the game is still in active development at Arkane Lyon. Speaking to Entertainment Weekly as part of a broader piece on the state of Xbox, Howard said he saw the team's latest work on May 21 and came away impressed — even if he couldn't say when fans would get a proper update.

Howard's exact words: "I'm not at liberty to say when [we'll see more], but I saw some stuff just yesterday [on May 21] and the folks at Arkane are doing a really, really great job." That's the full extent of the update — no trailer, no release window, no platforms confirmed. Marvel's Blade was first announced at The Game Awards in December 2023 as a mature, single-player, third-person action game set in Paris, with Eric Brooks — the half-human, half-vampire Daywalker — as the lead. It still has no release date.

The reassurance matters because the timing couldn't have been more anxious. Blade was a no-show at the June 2026 Xbox Games Showcase, and the days that followed brought reports of impending studio closures at Ninja Theory, Double Fine, and Compulsion Games. An Arkane artist had already asked fans to "let the studio cook" earlier in June, but that did little to quiet cancellation fears. Polygon notes that Arkane Lyon may not have entered full production on Blade until late 2024 — a full year after the reveal — which would make the sparse communication less surprising, though no less frustrating. For context, Marvel's Wolverine was announced by Insomniac in September 2021 and is only arriving in September 2026.

Howard's statement is a sign of life, but PC Gamer points out it's not a clean bill of health — Xbox announced a new Ninja Theory game at the very showcase where it was reportedly planning to shut the studio down. Whether Arkane Lyon is genuinely secure or simply next in line remains an open question. Neither Microsoft nor Marvel Games responded to requests for comment.