‘Sleeping Dogs’ Designer Would "Love To See It Come Back", Hints At Movie Progress

The lead gameplay designer for the much-loved (by those who played it) 2012 open-world adventure game Sleeping Dogs has said that he’d love to see a sequel come out - even if he can’t be personally involved in its creation.

Steven Ferreira, who is currently the game director of Apex Legends at Respawn Entertainment, told us that Sleeping Dogs “holds a special place in my heart”. He added, “I put a lot of my passion into that game. In fact, I’ve got this right here…” And then he produced, from his desk, a very fancy looking edition of Sleeping Dogs, almost like he knew we’d be asking him about it. 

Remind yourself how great Sleeping Dogs is/was by watching the trailer, below

“I’d love to see that come back,” he continued. “It has a lot of similar traits to Apex, in that we put a lot of effort into making that game what we wanted it to be, as developers, and it has a very authentic feel. That’s why it resonated with people. And you know, if there was a different business model around that game, I think you would have seen another one.”

Developed by United Front Games and published by Square Enix, Sleeping Dogs cast the player as undercover police officer Wei Shen (played by Will Yun Lee) who infiltrates Triad organisations of Hong Kong. Set in an open-world version of real-life Hong Kong, specifically Hong Kong Island, the game received a positive critical reception, with strong reviews on its launch platforms of PlayStation 3, Xbox 360 and PC. A ‘Definitive Edition’ of the game followed for PlayStation 4 and Xbox One in 2014, and a Mac release appeared in 2016.

But despite great reviews and warm player response, Sleeping Dogs was judged to have sold poorly by its publisher, underperforming against expectations. Plans for a sequel began to take shape in 2013, but the project was cancelled before it really got going; and a spin-off MMO called Triad Wars was also scrapped. Thus, Sleeping Dogs is the only product of this particular gaming universe we’ve been able to play.

Square Enix

“If somebody else has the opportunity to do it, I'd love to see what they come up with,” Ferreira continued. “I don't think anything is so precious that it should just never be touched again. Even if it's not the same people who [made the first game], seeing what a new generation of developers would make of that [world], and continue that story on, would be exciting.” 

And then, perhaps a cheeky nod to a project that may still be in the works: “I think there's something to build from there. And maybe it's a movie, who knows?” While - so far as we know - there is no new Sleeping Dogs game in production, in 2017 it was announced that a movie, starring Rogue One’s Donnie Yen as Wei Shen, was on the cards. We’ve not heard a lot about its progress since, though. In 2020, Yen offered a small update saying production would start soon; and in 2021 he added to that, telling Collider: “I'm still hopeful. I mean, every day they tell me it's going to happen… I believe in destiny. So, if it's going to happen, hopefully, it will happen in the first half of next year.”

Which is… right about now, actually. So might Ferreira’s comment to us - and the fact he had a Sleeping Dogs something so close to hand while we were speaking, bit suss that - suggest that production is beginning on the movie? Maybe… and maybe not. We draw no conclusions - but I think we can all agree that More Sleeping Dogs would only be a good thing. You can find our full interview with Ferreira about Apex Legends, as the battle royale hit marks its third anniversary, here.