‘The Last of Us Part II’ Release Has Been Delayed Due To Coronavirus. No New Release Date Set.
After causing havoc with tv and film production, the COVID-19 Coronavirus has now hit a major game release as Sony, along with developer Naughty Dog, release statements saying ‘The Last of Us Part II’ will be delayed.
Sony first released a tweet saying “SIE has made the difficult decision to delay the launch of The Last of Us Part II and Marvel’s Iron Man VR until further notice. Logistically, the global crisis is preventing us from providing the launch experience our players deserve.” They followed that with another tweet stating “Currently, there are no other delays to report, but we’ll keep you updated.”
After the news started to pop up on various gaming sites, Naughty Dog took to social media themselves to explain:
“As you’ve likely just seen, the release of ‘The Last of Us Part II’ has been delayed. We’re sure this news is just as disappointing to you as it is to us. We wanted to reach out to all of you in our community to give you a little more information,” commented the developers.
“The good news is, we’re nearly done with the development of The Last of Us Part II,” they continued. “However, even with us finishing the game, we were faced with the reality that due to logistics beyond our control, we couldn’t launch The Last of Us Part II to our satisfaction. We want to make sure everyone gets to play The Last of Us Part II around the same time, ensuring that we’re doing everything possible to preserve the best experience for everyone. This meant delaying the game until such a time where we can solve these logistic issues.”
The game was originally supposed to launch in February 2020, but was pushed to the end of May due to the usual development issues you get with a game like this. Then the virus hit… The big issue now is getting it to people. With shipping disrupted, and most gaming stores shut, that becomes rather tricky. Sure, they could just do a pure digital release, but that could have a massive impact on sales, and also mean a portion of the market may not be able to play it on release, hence the delay.
Whilst this is disappointing, gamers are pretty used to games being delayed, although it is usually due to development issues rather than a global pandemic… However, when it does launch, you will not only have a new game to play, but a new tv show to look forward to, as we revealed a few weeks ago that Craig Mazin, the man who created the multi-award-winning drama ‘Chernobyl’, is working on a drama based on the franchise for HBO.
Currently, there is no new release date for ‘The Last of Us Part II’, but we’ll let you know when we hear more.
