TORN Cancelled?

Having been gone since yesterday morning, I was shocked to learn today that there is a very good possibility that the RPG being developed by Black Isle Studios, TORN, has been cancelled and many of the development team involved have been laid off. There are several reputable news sites that are reporting its cancellation as fact, such as Voodoo Extreme and Freelancer. Here’s a snippet of a report from Freelancer:

Having communicated with our good friends who are aware of the details, we made the following conclusions. What is known for sure – one of TORN head designers, Scott Warner, has left BIS. The reasons are still unknown but it may be related to developers’ or managers’ plans to port TORN for Omen engine – the one used for Neverwinter Nights and obviously having better stats than Lith Tech 3.1. Another confirmation of this explanation is the absence of new TORN screenshots since last E3. I can assure you, all the screenshots published since PR people took that time from E3 Press Kit. Even the official site was updated with concept art only, holding nobody liable for anything. The engine replacement is very painful issue for developers and project promotion. Especially, if it is done 6 months before the release date. Generally, the team couldn’t manage to handle the difficulties, and the project was closed. Yesterday Chris Taylor (though he is working for 14 Degree East), have visited one of fan forums and said the project is closed indeed, and some employees of Interplay divisions have lost their jobs, including Chris Taylor – head designer of Fallout Tactics.