Development issues stemming from the COVID-19 coronavirus pandemic have struck again, this time with Arc System Works’ Guilty Gear Strive. The fighting game has been delayed from its late 2020 release for PS4 to early 2021. A message from producer Takeshi Yamanaka explained that due to the pandemic, “every aspect of our development schedule has faced delays.”
“While our company’s staff and our business partners are putting in a sincere effort in dealing with the changes due to the spread of COVID-19, every aspect of our development schedule has faced delays. In addition, we have decided to set up a schedule to further improve the quality of the game responding to everyone’s help and feedback from the recent closed beta test,” he said.
“We apologize sincerely to everyone who has been anticipating the release with keen excitement. Ourselves, we are dedicated to bringing you a new Guilty Gear game that will satisfy all of our fans. Please be assured that we will make good use of that extra time to do this.”
Guilty Gear Strive is the latest in delays resulting from the pandemic. Minecraft Dungeons, Wasteland 3, Hellpoint, Amazon’s New World, Marvel’s Iron Man VR and, perhaps most infamously, The Last of Us Part 2 all faced delays due to the same. These issues stemmed from the transition to working from home.
The Xbox Series X and PS5 haven’t deviated from the holiday 2020 release windows just yet. Sony assured investors recently that its first-party and partners’ studios hadn’t faced any issues in the development pipeline just yet. Xbox boss Phil Spencer did note that there would be an impact on 2021 releases due to the pandemic, especially since facilities like mocap haven’t been operating.
In the meantime, stay tuned for more updates and details on Guilty Gear Strive. More gameplay is almost assuredly on the way in the interim.
A message from Takeshi Yamanaka, the producer of #GuiltyGearStrive. pic.twitter.com/BbuFT6zKK3
— Arc System Works America (@ArcSystemWorksU) May 15, 2020
