In lieu of any official project from Sony, one die-hard Ape Escape fan called Yahya Danboos on YouTube decided to remake a portion of the original PlayStation game in Unreal Engine 4. Specifically, they remade the first game’s opening level, which is a small and simple area that only tasks the player with capturing three apes.

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As highlighted by Push Square, it’s an incredibly faithful recreation, from the UI and the design of player character Spike to the apes themselves. While it’s not overly polished, it’s an impressive feat for only one person and is probably the closest thing fans will get to a PlayStation 5 remake. Yahya Danboos has also uploaded the demo to itch.io so anyone can download it and try it out for themselves, but they stress that they have no intention of remaking any more of the game beyond this opening level.

In a perfect world, the positive reception from fans will reach Sony and encourage it to greenlight a new Ape Escape project, whether it be a PS5 remake or an entirely new game. Considering there hasn’t been a new mainline entry since 2006’s Ape Escape 3, a remake in the same vein as the Crash Bandicoot N. Sane Trilogy would probably make the most sense since it could potentially reach a new audience as well as old fans.

However, the original studio behind the Ape Escape series, Japan Studio, technically doesn’t exist anymore. It wasn’t shut down but, in April, Sony reorganized the studio and merged it with Team Asobi, which was originally a part of Japan Studio but has now become its own independent studio. With Team Asobi dedicated entirely to continuing the Astro Bot games thanks to the success of Astro’s Playroom (a free game bundled with every PS5), it seems extremely unlikely that any Ape Escape project will be considered.

Japan Studio was also responsible for the likes of Knack and the Gravity Rush games, all of which are just as unlikely to see new entries any time soon. Many of Japan Studio’s most prolific employees left around the time of the restructuring too, such as Silent Hill and Gravity Rush creator Keiichiro Toyama, who now runs his own studio.

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Source: Push Square