Musicians making wild pivots to new ventures are nothing new, after all, Akon once tried to build Akon City in Senegal, Nicki Minaj has strayed into politics by throwing her support behind President Donald Trump, and Travis Scott is starring in The Odyssey.
Fortnite, Call of Duty, and Grand Theft Auto have welcomed everyone from Dr Dre to Snoop Dogg, while the latter is an avid gamer who’s even got an upcoming appearance in Stranger Than Heaven.
As the worlds of music and video games continue to collide, we’re still confused by Kanye West’s attempt at entering the market.
It’s been 10 years since he announced Only One, and while the game was never officially cancelled, it’s fallen into that weird backrooms space of lost video games.
What was Kanye West’s Only One?
Initially announced during the Yeezy Season 3 fashion show in February 2016, Only One gained plenty of fanfare when its trailer was showcased at E3 2016. Around this time, West gave everyone a peek inside his mind when he said, “The idea of the game is my mom travelling through the gates of heaven. I just wanna bring as much beauty to the world as possible.”
Only One was named after the song of the same name and was supposed to be dedicated to his late mother, Donda West.
Planned as an iOS game and being developed by Los Angeles-based film and animation studio, Encyclopedia Pictura, there wasn’t much else to go on.
West has apparently had an interest in video games from a young age, creating a Mario-inspired title with ‘sexual themes’ at the age of just 12. Following the death of his mother, the idea of Only One emerged, thought to be a linear game about getting Donda to heaven.
The E3 trailer featured a pixelated version of her riding a winged horse through the clouds and trying to ascend while surrounded by other angels.
After Only One resurfaced onReddit, our interest was piqued. This lost bit of gaming history was pitched as an ‘endless’ runner that has no concept of death, which doesn’t exactly have us thinking it would be giving GTA VI a run for its money in 2026. Given West’s early gaming attempts of emulating Mario, Only One, being an endless runner like Super Mario Run, makes sense.
Sticking with the Nintendo theme, West even pitched Only One tothe legendary Shigeru Miyamoto.
ABusiness Insider article from 2017 explained how Only One was already raising red flags as it slipped into development hell and had lost funding.
Still, a representative for West maintained that things were moving along as they added: “Development of the game continues. Kanye is an artist whose creative process takes time, and he is lucky to be doing work in a medium that naturally lends itself to an elongated, constantly evolving creative process.
“He is steadily continuing work on the game, and will deliver more updated visuals and progress as they grow ready.”
Nine years after that less-than-optimistic update, there’s no sign of Only One ever spreading its wings.
Of course, West’s public image has also changed a lot since 2016, with the controversial artist taking out a full-page advert in the Wall Street Journal to apologise for his antisemitic behaviour while also reiterating: “I am not a Nazi or an antisemite.”
Whether West will ever return to video games remains to be seen, but for the foreseeable future, Only One remains another bizarre celebrity title that we’ll likely never get to play.
