Did Matt Groening just accidentally confirm a Simpsons Hit & Run return?
Matt Groening appears to have let something slip at Disney's D23 event on August 14. Asked about The Simpsons Hit & Run, the franchise creator said the beloved 2003 game was "coming back in some form" — only for showrunner Matt Selman to jump in with a hasty "or not." The exchange has lit up gaming communities, and for good reason: the GTA-style Simpsons game has been stuck in licensing limbo for over two decades with no official re-release on modern platforms.
The slip
Hit & Run originally launched on PS2, GameCube, and Xbox in 2003. It sold around 10 million copies alongside Radical Entertainment's other titles and scored an 81 on Metacritic — solid numbers for a licensed game. When Activision shut down Radical Entertainment in 2013, the game quietly disappeared from storefronts and has never officially returned. The holdup isn't technical: it's licensing. The Simpsons IP involves multiple rights holders, and Disney's acquisition of Fox added another layer of complexity.
Groening's comment at D23 is the strongest signal yet that someone, somewhere, is working on a deal. Selman himself told People magazine earlier this year that a re-release was "possible," so this isn't the first hint — just the most public one.
Asked if there’ll be another The Simpsons: Hit Run game, Matt Groening says: “I think the original game is coming back in some form…”
— Empire (@empiremagazine) August 14, 2026
“…or not,” says current showrunner Matt Selman. Sounds like there may be some news coming that wasn’t supposed to be announced yet… #D23 pic.twitter.com/qC98wLeQsK
The studio angle
Timing makes Groening's slip harder to dismiss as pure noise. In February 2026, veterans of the original Radical Entertainment reformed as New Radical Games, led by co-founder Ian Wilkinson. The studio's website explicitly advertises remaster and port services and prominently features Hit & Run. Whether they are actually contracted for anything remains unconfirmed — but the pieces are conspicuously in place.
No platform holder — PlayStation, Xbox, or Nintendo — has signaled a pre-order or listing. Disney has stayed quiet. That silence likely means any deal isn't finalized, even if talks are happening.
What's next
Gamescom in Cologne runs August 26–30, roughly ten days after Groening's comment went viral. It's a plausible venue for a formal announcement if Disney and Fox are ready to move. But 23 years of licensing gridlock is a real obstacle, not a formality — even if a remaster gets greenlit tomorrow, a release could still be years away. For now, one accidental sentence at a fan convention is all fans have to go on.
Source: Empire Magazine
