Rockstar almost made a zombie game before Undead Nightmare

During the rise of the Grand Theft Auto series, Rockstar was apparently in the development of a zombie game pitched by the studios’ art team in 2002. This was a decade before the release of Red Dead Redemption: Undead Nightmare and the pop-culture boom of zombie franchises.

This comes from ex-developer Obbe Vermeij, who posted this insider information on his blog—”Development of the trilogy & IV.” Unfortunately, the blog post has been taken down by Rockstar. Other posts detailing the development of Grand Theft Auto 1,2,3, Vice City, and Manhunt have, however, been preserved through the Internet Archive.

“Z” was set to be a survival game with an emphasis on travel based in Scotland. But Rockstar pulled the plug on the project because it was “too depressing” to work on. The initial idea was pitched by the studio’s art team, who often drew zombies in their spare time, but even the creators of the project got infected with fatigue after only a month of development. The team would go on to create the critically acclaimed Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas.

Interestingly, Z was going to be set in Scotland, where Rockstar’s main offices reside, and would have featured fuel management in an open-world environment—a mechanic that was featured heavily in Bend Studio’s Days Gone. Not much else is known about the project, but Vermeij also divulged information about a more well-known title

Z wasn’t the only canceled project highlighted by Rockstar—a James Bond-inspired spy game was also canceled because it was “too much of a distraction” to other ongoing projects. This title was announced as a PlayStation exclusive in 2009 called Agent, but internally, it had a far stranger codename.

Vermeij said “Jimmy” was its internal name to highlight the Scottish descent of the protagonist. Jimmy used transforming vehicles to carry out his missions set in the 1970s. Vermeij detailed information about the game, including its linear, level-based structure, mission locations, and his work on one of the game’s levels, featuring an explosive chase across a ski resort in Switzerland.

Unfortunately, Jimmy slowly faded into obscurity as the game’s development was put on the back burner during GTA IV’s development, and the project was officially terminated over a year into production.