"The game had fundamental design challenges from the start," wrote studio boss Mike Verdu in an internal memo obtained by Kotaku. "We fought to correct the issues, but we were not successful; the game just isn't coming together well enough to meet our own quality expectations as well as those of our consumers."

"Unfortunately, this action will result in several individuals on the team being released," Verdu continued. "We will make every effort to place affected individuals on projects within the studio--and where that isn't possible, to connect them with opportunities in other teams at EA."

An Electronic Arts spokesperson confirmed the cancellation and the loss of staff. The game was originally scheduled for release in late 2008 but was pushed back to 2009 or 2010 for unexplained reasons. Verdu, for his part, is more concerned with moving forward, but doing a better job in the future.

"We need to make sure this doesn't happen again. I believe we are already doing a better job of engineering success in from the start. The quality bar has been raised. Now we need to step up our focus on great design and execution, catching any problems early and correcting them quickly."