One of the most beloved, if slightly odd, franchises from the Sega Megadrive era is going to return with Ecco the Dolphin creator, Ed Annunziata, heading up a team that will remaster the first two games and create a third title.
An 8,500 hour countdown started on eccothedolphin.com, that is equivalent to almost a year so we will be getting the full reveal, or perhaps even the games, at the end of April 2026.
“Me and the entire original team are going to remaster the original Ecco the Dolphin and Tides of Time games,” Annunziata says. “Then we will make a new, third game with contemporary play and GPU sensibilities. Stay tuned to eccothedolphin.com.”
Annunziata’s involvement may surprise some as he sued Sega for ownership rights of the Ecco IP when he tried to make a sequel via Kickstarter. A settlement was reached, but the details were never revealed.
The original game had you playing as Ecco as he swam through the seas and travels to the Arctic Ocean where he meets a whale called Big Blue. Its here things start to get a bit odd as Ecco then has to collect orbs of power from Atlantis to charge up Asterite, the oldest life form on Earth. The dolphin then uses a time travel machine to nip back to meet some dinosaurs, learns to talk to a Pteranodon, then zips through a portal in to outer space where he fights and alien queen. Not THE Alien Queen, but that is a movie I want to see, Ripley the Dolphin!
A sequel, Ecco: The Tides of Time was released, and Ecco games continued to be made in later years, but these were for educational porpoises.
The first two games were also ported to numerous system and could be played as part of the Sega Genesis Collection on PlayStation and Xbox.
Source: Xbox.com
