Ever since the first season of Daredevil‘s Netflix series and his rare appearance in official MCU projects, the Man Without Fear has had a resurgence in the last decade. It’s interesting to discover that before that happened, the blind superhero had an actual console game that never saw the light of day that was recently discovered.
The licensed game was known as Daredevil: The Man Without Fear, a third-person beat’em up action game for PC, PS2, and the original Xbox, and was based on Frank Miller’s Daredevil comic run with the game’s narrative based on the Elektra Lives Again storyline. The unearthed prototype of the game was sent to video game preservation website Hidden Palace by an anonymous developer, with SolidSnake11 putting in the work to make it playable in 2023.
At the time, the game was set to be published by Encore Inc. and with development handled by 5,000 Ft Studios, but it was abruptly cancelled in 2004. The reason behind the cancellation was allegedly the console generation leader, Sony, which made some odd requests of the game, like a Tony Hawk Pro Skater grind mechanic, for instance. The scope of the project and budget ended up going in a different direction than Marvel’s concept of the game, and the development ran into engine troubles. It ended up being cancelled altogether.
With almost 19 years since the cancellation, it feels the want of a Daredevil game more in the tone of the Arkham games has been bubbling with fans. A Marvel’s Spider-man 2 easter egg revealed that the text on the plaque of Matt Murdock and Foggy Nelson’s Hell Kitchen law office is missing, with an eviction notice plastered on the door.
Could this be a hint that The Man Without Fear could be making his debut in Insomniac’s Marvel universe in DLC or a future game, though? Well, we don’t really know, but during IGN’s spoilercast with Marvel’s Spider-Man 2’s Creative Director, Bryan Intihar non-commented on the possibility, only teasing, “That’s a good question,…stay tuned, good find though.”
