The Biggest Game Delays of 2016, Ranked by Heartache

this is not about that. this is about the unique feelings of sadness and longing of each delay. This is a clinical study into the depths of our inner child – the one who fears we will never be good enough, the one who just wants someone to love, but most of all, the one who really wants to play all of these awesome games yesterday.

mirror’s edge http://www.ign.com/articles/2015/10/29/mirrors-edge-catalyst-delayed?watch

Mirror’s Edge was delayed three months, moving from a February 23 release date to a May 24 one. As much as Faith fans were looking forward to another minimalist parkour adventure, there weren’t exactly tears shed over this one, but merely a tinge of pain knowing those extra 90 days didn’t stop its flat story and unwanted combat.

South Park fractured but whole

Fractured But Whole will be coming to us Q1 2017 instead of in December this year, abandoning us right before the holidays, just like Mom said it would.

mighty no 9 http://www.ign.com/articles/2016/01/25/mighty-no-9-suffers-third-delay?watch

Here we’re getting to delays that made us wince a little harder, and few games were as wince-worthy as Mighty No. 9 and its nail-biting development cycle. Originally slated to release in September of 2015, delayed to February 2016, and then finally released this June to less than stunning reviews, this game has basically been set to release in every season of the year. Except for Winter because, again, you’ll be spending the season of joy alone.

Persona 5 http://www.ign.com/articles/2015/09/17/persona-5-has-been-delayed?watch

For series fans, every day since Persona 4’s 2008 release date has been like a slow crawl through the seven circles of hell. And right when we thought we were nearing the end of our personal, highly overdramatized Dante’s Inferno reenactments, Atlus pushed another circle in front of us, moving the release from Winter 2014 to 2015. Then once more to September 2016 for the Japanese version. Then the North American version again to February 14, 2017.

Ten circles of hell, Atlus? How could you?

Kingdom Hearts 2.8

Before we complete our decade-long wait for Kingdom Hearts 3, we’ll need to make it to the release of 2.8, which was pushed from this December to January of 2017. Not a large delay, but when you take into account the wait times for 2.9, 2.95, 2.97 Rebirth, 2.99∞/16 days – the road to Kingdom Hearts 3 really adds up.

Halo Wars 2

Moving from Fall 2016 to February 21, 2017, Halo Wars 2 was just the tip of the iceberg for a number of Microsoft delays this year, each filling you with a greater sense of abandonment than the last.

recore http://www.gamepur.com/news/23450-recore-just-got-delayed-december-2016-pc-and-xbox-one-according-amazon.html

Another Keiji Inafune title, ReCore’s 2016 release jumped from Spring to September like some really demented attempt at Daylight Savings. We shed a graceful tear for not only its lukewarm reviews, but that a star member of the Xbox One’s touted lineup could not arrive sooner.

crackdown 3 http://www.polygon.com/e3/2016/6/13/11924072/crackdown-3-delayed-to-2017

But who needs ReCore when the Xbox is getting Crackdown 3, which was announced at E3 2014, slated for Q3 2016, and now scheduled for a mystery 2017 date. A tear for each layer of dust on our consoles.

scalebound http://www.ign.com/articles/2016/01/04/scalebound-delayed-to-2017?watch

Our dust metaphor grows ever more dramatic with the delay of Microsoft’s Scalebound, the epic dragon game that was delayed from sometime in 2016 to sometime in 2017. It’s going to be a huge, open-world RPG with co-op mechanics. It’s gonna let us control and deck out dragons. Director Hideki Kamiya – the director behind Resident Evil 2, Devil May Cry, Ōkami, and Bayonetta – said it would be the biggest game of his career. *Your heart bursts into a million green pieces*

no man’s sky

In light of the tsunami of No Man’s Sky coverage you’ve likely seen in the past month or two, we will keep this quick. No Man’s Sky was delayed from June 2016 to August 2016.

u4 http://www.polygon.com/2016/3/1/11144170/uncharted-4-release-date-may-10-2016-ps4

Happiness is inversely proportional to the distance between us and Nathan Drake. We got months less happy over a course of delays moving its 2015 release window to March 2016, then to April 2016, and finally to May 2016.

the last guardian Dec. 6, 2016

2016 release date. During this year’s E3, Sony announced the game would be released on Oct. 25, 2016

December 6, 2016

We spent a good chunk of time getting over The Last Guardian, beliving it to have slipped into the void in the years after its 2009 reveal. We had just barely moved on when it returned in 2015,

ME Andromeda http://www.ign.com/videos/2016/03/02/mass-effect-andromeda-delayed-to-2017-ign-daily-fix

Sarah McLachlan plays every time you think of Mass Effect: Andromeda. You can count the number of details we have on the game on one hand. This year, you slowly lowered one of those fingers when it was delayed from Q4 2016 to a release window that feels exceptionally prone to another delay, Q1 2017: where dreams go to die.

ffxv

Here are a list of things that didn’t exist when Final Fantasy XV was first announced (as Final Fantasy Versus XIII) at E3 2006: The entire Uncharted series, Twitch.tv, the iPhone, the final Harry Potter book. So many great things have come into our lives, but none of them were Final Fantasy XV.

At the Uncovered: Final Fantasy XV in March, Square Enix held a lengthy live show filled with surprises culminating in a long-awaited release date: November 30th.

Ha- ha, just kidding. The countdown clock spun backwards to September 30, and we all laughed November to shame.

Last month, Final Fantasy XV was delayed to November 29, 2016, and a million reaction gifs could not convey our heartache.