This week has been a week of delays in video games. First it was XCOM successor Phoenix Point getting pushed, now we’ve got more delays to disappoint fans and gamers. This time, it’s all about Shenmue III. Developed by former Sega legend Yu Suzuki’s Ys Net studio, Shenmue III is the crowdfunded entry into the revenge storyline of Ryu Hazuki.
Deep Silver has announced they’ve pushed back the game’s release until 2019 to polish the game and give it a solid release window. The brief statement reads:
The extra time will be used to polish the quality of the game even further, to the high standards it deserves and release the product in the best possible timeframe.
There was a further comment on the release date change from Yu Suzuki:
To all of our backers, we are very sorry for the delay. After much discussion with our partners, Deep Silver, we have concluded that extending the release will allow us to deliver Shenmue III at its best. We promise to use this time to improve the quality of Shenmue III.
We cannot thank you enough for your enduring support.
The game has suffered multiple delays in its development cycle since Shenmue 3 was originally announced at Sony’s E3 2015 press event.And even though Sega is currently at work on HD remasters of Shenmue I and II, fans will have a to wait a lot longer to get their hands on the continuation of the franchise.
All in all, these kinds of delays are sometimes a bad sign for game development, but that may not be the case here. Let’s just hope all this extra development time is being used wisely to deliver on the best game possible.
“A delayed game is eventually good, but a rushed game is forever bad.”
– Shigeru Miyamoto
