Forspoken Has Been Given A Crushing Delay
Forspoken was meant to be a big title released this year, but the game has sadly been given a crushing delay, adding itself to the long list of delayed entries.
This article is more than 2 years old
Following months of announcements and releases, like the Final Fantasy VII for Valve’s Steam Deck, Japanese entertainment media conglomerate and gaming giant, Square Enix, decided to push one of its highly anticipated titles into 2023. The previously announced action-adventure role-playing game Forspoken was delayed into the next years, with Square Enix calling the move a “strategic decision” that would grant the game’s developer more time to polish the game.
According to IGN, both Square Enix and Luminous Productions (the game’s publisher and developer, respectively) announced on Twitter that the game is rescheduled for January 24, 2023. As per their joint statement, all of the game’s elements are complete, and the development has entered a final polishing phase which ensures a smooth-running highly optimized end result. Both companies expressed gratitude for the fandom’s support and patience, promising to share more of Forspoken later this summer.
This is the second major delay for Forspoken, which isn’t all that surprising considering the massive delays that the industry suffered for the past two or three years and the talks of video game recessions caused by the global business and political landscape. The game was initially revealed in 2020, under the name of Project Athia, which followed Frey, a seemingly average young woman, to the magical lands of Athia, where her magical abilities manifest. She embarks on a mission to save the land from the corrupted ruling matriarchs, using what appears to be magical combat parkour.
Forspoken was originally planned to launch in May of this year for PlayStation 5 and Windows PC, but Square Enix decided to push the game for October 11 under the very same pretext — the game needs additional polishing. We just hope that so much polishing doesn’t thin out the material and reduce its quality to mere visuals and a few flashy moves by the game’s protagonist. It’s worth noting that this is Square Enix’s open-world game, as the company continues its push towards open-world releases following the massive changes introduced in the upcoming Final Fantasy XVI.
For the time being, the game appears to be on track for release, despite the numerous delays. It’s entirely possible that Square Enix and Luminous Productions are pushing delays to distance the game from any major gaming releases or to create more hype for the game through marketing efforts. Unfortunately, apart from the aforementioned release date and tale-old-as-time setting, we don’t actually know anything about the upcoming game in terms of gaming mechanics, features, etc. What is magic parkour, and how does it work? Does it spend any resources?
Considering that the company announced a showcase for Forspoken in the summer, it’s entirely possible that the company is really polishing the title and trying to create more hype around the game, which would result in better overall sales and market performance. Whatever the case may be, the delay isn’t all that surprising, considering that the games have been dropping their 2022 release dates, including Santa Monica’s God of War: Ragnarok, which took everyone by surprise by bringing the release date forward.
