Terrible, terrible news may have just arrived as it surfaces that Michel Ancel's planned Beyond Good & Evil 2 may have been cancelled by publishers Ubisoft, again shutting any hope that gamers will get to see another instalment in the series.

The news comes via RockPaperShotgun, who point to the twitter feed of Colin Solal Cardo of Gamesyde, who claims he confirmed the news at GamesCom 2009.

“I got confirmation at Cologne’s Gamescom that Beyond Good & Evil 2 is on hold for now," posted Colin. "No idea if it’s def or temporary but it sucks.”

The news is hardly surprising of course, with Ubisoft never committing to publishing the game anyway and only confirming that something was in development when it was leaked that pre-production had begun on the long-awaited sequel to Michel Ancel's monstrously moving action-adventure.

"Whether or not it [Beyond Good and Evil 2] comes out remains to be seen anyway," said Ubisoft president Laurent Detoc in an interview last July. "We didn't want to abandon that IP because it has a cachet and authenticity about it. There's something very pure about that game and it's too bad that we were not able to build it as an IP at the time."

Since the news was leaked last year there's been very little news on the series, with our own attempts to try and catch a look at the game at GamesCom 2009 being avoided. The fact that the game has been cancelled should come as no surprise, especially given how poor the first game sold and the current state of the economy.

For those of you not in-the-know, Beyond Good & Evil was the story of an alien world being besieged by an alien race, though the plot focused on exposing the conspiracy at the heart of the invasion and not battling large numbers of aliens. It fused a number of different genres, but was mainly a stealth and puzzle game with one of the best game soundtracks ever. It's also one of the few games to ever bring us to tears.

Disappointed that the game has been shelved? Of course you are - so commiserate in the forums.