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Alice creator American McGee has been in something of a chatty mood lately. Just a couple days after relating a tale about how he drew inspiration from a Valve demo he saw while working on Quake 2 at id, he shared another story about Alice: Madness Returns, offering a fun glimpse into game dev financing, dildo snails, and maybe why EA may have decided not to move ahead with a third game in the series.
“It would be fair to say that there was a fairly big disconnect between the game I wanted to make and the game EA Marketing wanted me to make when we were developing Madness Returns,” McGee wrote on X. “The marketing team felt strongly that a hard M title focused on gore, horror, and featuring a ‘psychotic’ Alice was what audiences would respond to best.”
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It would be fair to say that there was a fairly big disconnect between the game I wanted to make and the game EA Marketing wanted me to make when we were developing Madness Returns.The marketing team felt strongly that a Hard M title focused on gore, horror, and featuring a… https://t.co/HddXtHuWXzApril 23, 2026
The deal “was fantastic until it wasn’t,” he continued. McGee said Alice: Madness Returns needed another 30-60 days for polishing and edits: “EA, probably a bit out of spite, said, ‘no.’ Fair play.”
“And so, we delivered the game precisely on budget and schedule without interface from EA. But also without the ability to request and receive a final month or two of editing,” McGee concluded.
“We made history in relation to all this. Madness Returns wasn’t just the first AAA game fully developed by a Chinese team. It was also the first ever game to be bond financed in China. We were also the first team ever to tell EA gyf and (kinda) get away with it.”
(I assume the “gyf” is a typo and that he actually means “gfy,” which is an acronym you can probably figure out without my help.)
Now, is it likely that EA declined Alice 3 because it’s holding a grudge? Not really. This was a long time ago, and more pointedly, business is business: If EA reckons there’s sufficient dollars on the table, then all will be forgiven no matter what anyone did. Still, it is kind of amusing to imagine Andrew Wilson getting up from his desk and yelling at McGee as he walks into the office, “Hey! Hey! I told you you’re not allowed in here anymore, god dammit!”
McGee, for the record, is currently working on something kind of Alice adjacent: A spiritual successor based on his Plushie Dreadfuls toys. In another tweet posted earlier this week, McGee said he’s got “a little team” working on it, “all people I’ve known, loved, and trusted for years.”
