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Games go through a lot. They go on hold, have their release date delayed or simply get cancelled. With the recent delays of highly anticipated games, a simple question might have come across your mind: “Why?"

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One of the biggest let down of the week for many of you is probably the news of "Zelda U” getting postponed for 2017. Initially announced in 2013 as under development for Nintendo’s latest home console, the news got many early adopters of the Wii’s successor excited and hopeful for a console with a thin lineup of games and poor third-party support. Console sales haven’t been flattering either and the WiiU has since been kept afloat almost solely by first-party titles. "Just wait till the new Zelda gets released and the Wii U will be the must-buy console", was what on the hearts of many. The 2014 E3 footage of the game sure seemed to lean towards this thought and with a for a 2015 release announcement it rekindled the Zelda passion in many gamers. However in 2015 the game’s release got delayed to 2016 and still this week it got delayed once more to 2017, this time for a dual release for both Wii U and the NX. This is strongly reminiscent of the simultaneous release of Twilight Princess for the GameCube and Wii which effectively marked the end of the GCN. This release pattern feels almost like a heartfelt farewell gift to the dedicated supporters of an ailing console.

#E3 2016 will focus on The Legend of Zelda, launching simultaneously on both Wii U and NX in 2017 pic.twitter.com/XQDomqXk7k

— Nintendo of America (@NintendoAmerica) April 27, 2016

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In such cases, one can’t help but be reminded of Shigeru Miyamoto’s famous quote:

A delayed game is eventually good, a bad game is bad forever.

Following this mantra, Assassin’s Creed: Unity is an example no developer/publisher wants to follow. Looking unashamedly rushed and bug-laden on release, the game is one of the most recent examples that can justify the increasing number of delayed games. Video game developers and especially publishers are getting more cautious and aim to deliver a more complete video game experience. Bloodborne’s release was pushed to make way for one of the best entries of the series. Delay justified! Duke Nukem Forever was released after being 15 years in development. Delay justified? Hmmm… More recently, Mirror’s Edge Catalyst has been delayed for the second time this year. Delay justified? Remains to be seen...

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In other news, Bandai Namco’s follow-up to Street Fighter X Tekken is currently in development hell. Six years after being announced, the game has been put on hold. But this time, the reason is different than other game's delay reasons. As Tekken producer Katsuhiro Harada explained in a GameSpot interview “you have Street Fighter V that was just released and a lot of people are playing that fervently. We have a large crowd out there that is waiting for Tekken 7. So, we don’t want to split these communities. So, the window that is a good window to release Tekken X Street Fighter is something that has become much more difficult." In this case, timing is conflicting which is an interesting and understandable reason for delaying a game.

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Games go through a lot. But so do we! We get hyped for a game's release but only to learn that it will be delayed? Is it a marketing misstep or are we getting too greedy? Games are delayed for numerous reasons and most often it’s out of our hands, and usually for the best.

What’s your experience with delayed/cancelled games and how did you cope with it? And was the delay justified?

 

[DDTarZan]

Very fantastic article! The opinions of everyone really matters here, and how this affects them is quite interesting to read.

So I'm a bit embarrassed to say that the only game that I've felt the delayed-release whiplash on was Super Smash Bros. Brawl. Although it was only a few months after its original release, it still was delayed (at least?) two times. Pretty tough when at the time Smash is your favorite game and they've only then announced Sonic as a playable fighter.

 

[sarkwalvein]

Here's some more content!

@3:13
Are you sure it will be released next year (2015)?
YES.

Nintendo. Quality trolling since 1889.

 

[Reitel]

Are we really sure that Nintendo delayed the game because the want to polish it and not because they finally lost their faith into the WiiU and they want to give to the NX a better start?

 

[sarkwalvein]

Are we really sure that Nintendo delayed the game because the want to polish it and not because they finally lost their faith into the WiiU and they want to give to the NX a better start?

You can't lose what you never had.

That said, quite sure they are just pulling a twilight princess again. Just that.

 

[funnystory]

The new zelda wasn't delayed because it wasn't ready.It was delayed because the Wii U is dead and it is the correct marketing decision.

 

[John_Enigma]

^ Probably this.

And also, this.

 

[Jayro]

Nintendo knows we have a large backlog of games already, so they've decided not to release anything in 2016. Good guy Nintendo, always having our back.

*Lennyface*

 

[chartube12]

I have owned AC:Unity since it's release and the only glitching I ever got was during online co-op missions. The glitching being connecting/disconnecting problems. Otherwise the main game has been fully playable from beginning to end without any problems. In the case of this game, the talk of glitches was blown out of hand thanks to social media. The co-op missions were a very small and optional part of the game and are actually very repetitive. In full honesty they could have had some more story or side quest contain instead of the co-op and nomad app stuff.

 

[Prans]

@Subtle Demise you're on point. Delayed does not mean that the game will be better. Further examples can include Perfect Dark:Zero and Spore, each with high expectations that unfortunately failed to deliver.

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@ElyosOfTheAbyss and @Subtle Demise mentioning the unavailability of proper or total internet connection is an interesting way to consider those mandatory updates. Back in the days, I would never consider playing online games owing to poor internet connection and my consoles did not require updates either. I was satisfied with the way I got the games I bought and they would play on my console as is. Although 40% of the world population is connected to the internet today, it does not imply they all have the same type of internet connection. This has an impact on their experience of many video games but it also does not mean that they don't enjoy them.

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@Foxi4 and @endoverend I can relate too. I was not anticipating video games releases back in the days and mostly talked about it with friends and read from magazines and also learnt about old but gold games this way. And as I said in my previous comment, I was satisfied the way my games were. They played like they should. Even today I don't preorder nor buy games on release date but rather talk about it with others and conclude if it was all a fad or not, while trying to stay true to my old habits. However this is becoming harder and harder to achieve. We expect this and that game and want this and that from it too, now! And you might feel urged to play the game too or you'll feel left out or worse get spoiled. So basically you get the same game every year, with some different plot, different clothes and equipments. Here's your "new" game! It's hard to say what a good game truly is with all of our expectations. Would it be better if given more time? What would the game be like if the creators were given time to express themselves more truthfully?

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@Noctosphere Super Mario 128 basically turned into Super Mario Galaxy. If you haven't played it, do as it's the closest you'll get!

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Thanks for your kind words @DDTarZan! I aim to create engaging and interesting discussions with my articles for the GBAtemp community. If you're interested, you can check out my previous articles in my signature!

Ah SSBB! At least it had Snake, so I'll forgive them for the delay

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Nintendo. Quality trolling since 1889.

@sarkwalvein I'm secretly hoping that Magic Leap is the NX and Ninty is pulling a Kojima on us...

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@funnystory that is a plausible reason, most likely the only imaginable reason to delay the Wii U's most anticipated game.

 

[migles]

are we ignoring half life 3\half life 2 episode 3?
or we just forgot about it?

 

[FAST6191]

While that is partially true, Miyamoto's quote still works even today, as that is not the only thing to which he could have been referring to.
It is said that a person forms their impression of something within the first 30 seconds of contact, and will generally hold this opinion formed of the object from then on.
Apply this to video games; if a game is released and faces much community scrutiny due to being unfinished or buggy, then those people who invested into it will from now on have one set view of the title. Yes, today companies can push out patches, updates, and DLC's, but the both the game and its studio's credibility has dropped in the eyes of the viewer. This leads some, if not many of the original investors to not even try it for a second round, new/fixed content or not. This is what is happening with so many of the new Early Alpha games that are coming out today, and why many larger companies hesitate to try this new format. True, with Early Alphas at least they are admitting to an unfinished product, but that first impression still counts.
So, at the core, it is a matter about trust and credibility.
A bad game is a bad game forever indeed.

As I was typing that initial reply I was thinking about how I would break a game I could patch. There is a really good passage in a programming tutorial I once read, and apparently it is rehashed for lots of things and you have doubtless read a version but here is one https://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/s9ek7a19(v=vs.90).aspx for the others in the audience, that covers the various types of errors you can make in programming. I reckon that is pretty applicable to games as well and it would be the straight up underlying maths/logic that stand the break the game -- I can fix a memory leak, optimise performance, tweak a exp growth curve but I screw up fundamental logic or deviate too far from pareto frontiers or something and I am hosed. Sadly I see too many game devs, big and small, code without a spec they stick to and take the "it'll be all right on the night" approach so I see that more often than I should.

First impressions do count for a lot I think the extra credits folks cover it pretty well

That said I wonder if it is not a matter of perception as well. Think how things play out in the open source world where you first get the just about functional code and it grows from there. Or in games how online multiplayer is now less a nice perk and more a mandatory expense, one that has damaged more than a few games.

I was then reminded of the uproar over a RTS game that changed the entire tempo from the demo/beta to the real deal. I can't remember the name though and it was long enough ago (and the game not terribly well received) that searching is not getting me far.

I appear to be starting to ramble and never really had a point so I will leave it there.

 

[Burlsol]

That Miyamoto quote was obviously true in the past, but at the same time I don't know how well that works out for Nintendo anymore. While it's true that most of the main series Zelda games were delayed at least once, they were good in the end. But with the trend of Nintendo delaying games that still end up as a good to mediocre release (read: Star Fox Zero)? I'm much less okay with that.

At least companies have the decency to delay games, or else you get games like *shudder* Arkham Knight or Sonic Boom.

Except, even delayed games have been pretty bad.

Game delays usually are the result of the game needing more time to go through either quality controls (if they are even a thing in this age of buggy releases and extensive day 1 patches) or time for the team to add some much needed polish in an attempt to cover up the games flaws until they can be patched (Witcher 3). If a game is in delays, they usually aren't going to be doing anything drastic to the main parts of the game... and if they are, it's a reason to become very worried since the end result will likely be a jumbled clusterfuck of assets thrown together in an attempt to make a playable product (Dark Souls 2). While yes, it might be too soon to call a game or franchise in danger because of a delay, it is also too soon to call something saved because of a delay. Since this is Nintendo we're talking about, it could be anything from additional polish, to removing or toning down areas that are too taxing on the system, to trying to wedge in extra touchscreen and motion control gimmicks to keep their peripherals relevant.

But, on the other end of the table we have EA which doesn't delay anything no matter how broken a game is, and will just sell you the extra pieces for full price down the road... Or Ubisoft who releases the product and just throttles their Uplay servers so that people can't actually play the game until they've had a chance to patch it... Or they just shrug their shoulders and try to sell you the next Assassin's Creed game.

 

[dimmidice]

"A delayed game is eventually good, a bad game is bad forever."
In these days of common patches, DLC, expansion packs, rolling releases and "sequels" I am not sure that is so true. It is hardly ideal but not the same as burning a few thousand ROMs and sending them to machines with no menu/capacity for updates.

eh, if your game is bad on release it'l be perceived as bad for ever.

 

[FAST6191]

eh, if your game is bad on release it'l be perceived as bad for ever.

I review minecraft and don't do the current version and do one of the first ones and that is not going to go over well. Call it alpha or beta if you will but I think google broke those words some years ago.
I review the witcher and go for the first version rather than the enhanced version and I will get odd looks.
Can I really review borderlands without all the DLC? Especially as the xbone/ps4 packs exist with it all in.
I played world of warcraft on a blizzlike private server but without patches and DLC. Did I even play the game?
I played Assassin's creed on the PC, the one where it released months later (albeit leaked several months before the real release) with a bunch of side missions and extra content like that.

A fumbled release to the public is by no means a good thing and for the longest time in games, at least outside the PC, it was probably true. I just don't know if it is always the case any more as there are options. Frankly I like the idea of rolling releases for games as well as I have seen it work well for lots of other types of software, does well in books and even does OK in remastered or alternative cuts for films.

 

[dimmidice]

i'm talking about games that release and are broken on release. e.g. that batman game a while ago. it runs fine now but it's never recovered from it being a broken pile of crap. in the public mind it'l always be remembered as a bad game.

minecraft and WoW are different beasts altogether. the witcher wasn't really broken, it just has an enhanced edition. and AC i have no idea what you're even talking about.

 

[FAST6191]

That minecraft and wow can be treated as different entities would be evidence of the point I was trying to make. Equally I am certainly not advocating for broken releases (or early access if that is the modern take on the concept like expansion packs became DLC) and am very happy to have fully realised products to play from day 1 -- just because rolling release can work does not mean everything has to be, much like how useful (or not) or troubling for devs that let's plays are could also change along gameplay style/genre lines.

Batman might always be remembered poorly but I have seen other pieces of software (say Gimp or libre/open office or google docs or loads of other things) transcend what they were to become perceived differently. Even if it is not common now I can see a future where games feature among those.

On Assassin's Creed then the PC version appeared with a bunch of side quests (mainly fetch quests and assassinations) and whatever else like the later ones that force you to explore the cities a bit. All the reviews I saw of it mentioned there being nothing to do outside the main missions but when I came to it (it leaked months ahead of the official PC release date) it had all that which I could do.

 

[SSG Vegeta]

What is the name of the new Zelda game

 

[sarkwalvein]

What is the name of the new Zelda game

Unfortunately, the naming has also been delayed.

 

[Sheimi]

Mighty No. 9 been delayed how many times. Same with Zelda WiiU.

 

[Noctosphere]

Unfortunately, the naming has also been delayed.

Zelda Wii U release date?
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