The path to Mewgenics was a long one. It was revealed in 2012—yes, that's 14 years ago—and then delayed, and then cancelled outright. In 2018 Edmund McMillen announced that work had resumed, but instead of working with Team Meat partner Tommy Refenes, he was collaborating with Tyler Glaiel. A bit after that he warned that Mewgenics was still "a few years" away, and, well, eight years later, here we are.
Despite that long haul (or, maybe more likely, because of it), McMillen said in a new AMA on Reddit that finally getting Mewgenics out the door after all these years was a real moment of triumph—and one he never doubted.
"When the game was canceled I was crushed, but what could I do?" he wrote. "I can't force someone to enjoy working on a project only I was excited about. Not being able to work on something like that, something I believed in so much was quite depressing and probably one of the bigger reasons I decided to move on from [Team Meat]."
"It feels amazing to not only be able to work on/finish the project with Tyler, but it also feels like a 'SEE I TOLD YOU SO!' I knew this game would eventually see the light of day, and I knew it would be my best work. I just felt that deep for so long."
Mewgenics didn't take 14 years of work to create, to be clear: McMillen just seems to be perhaps a bit easily distracted. Mewgenics was put on hold not long after it was announced so Team Meat could focus on Super Meat Boy Forever instead; numerous other projects of various sizes followed, including Fingered, the Afterbirth DLC for Binding of Isaac: Rebirth, The End is Nigh, and The Legend of Bum-bo.
It wasn't until 2025 that McMillen and Glaiel appeared to really get on the gas, dropping one of the most bizarre live-action promotional trailers I've ever seen—and I've seen a lot of 'em.
Anyway, McMillen's belief and commitment to Mewgenics is validated by the fact that it was an immediate hit: More than 65,000 concurrent players on Steam as I write this, an "overwhelmingly positive" user rating, and more than 250,000 copies sold in less than 12 hours after release. That number will no doubt continue to go up: Mewgenics currently remains in the number one spot on Steam's top sellers list.
