Does anyone really care about delays?

Genuine question. When looking at recent delays like Batman Arkham Knight, Battlefield: Hardline, and The Witcher 3, I notice that the sentiment people tend to have is that it's better to delay a game and fix it than pull a Ubisoft. Though, sometimes companies want the games out in time for a certain quarter.

Has there ever been a case where consumers were mad because a game was delayed to continue work on it?

Watch)_(Dogs was one where people got a little peeved. Mostly because it was billed as a launch title for a new console though.

I think you're under the erroneous impression that a delayed game is inherently going to be better.

It's about striking a balance. Rushing a game out the door is bad. However, constant delays can be indicative of something "wrong" with the game (poor management, unclear vision, infighting on the development team, executive meddling, etc). Public reaction is going to be different from game to game, depending on the histories of the developer and publisher.

As far as specific examples of games where people have been upset at a delay, I guess Duke Nukem Forever technically counts, right?

I wouldn't say mad, but annoyed. It's one thing if they delay it to work out the bugs and then ship it. It's another thing entirely to pull a "Duke Nukem Forever" and keep the game in limbo for months or years after they said it would be released. At a certain point, why would they even bother with a release date in the first place? If the game is so screwed up that you have to keep pushing it back again and again and again.. What's the point?

I don't really have a problem with delays, but there is definitely a time limit. If you "delay" a game and it's not out by the same time the next year... Somebody screwed up. I'd rather them not say a release date at all than keep string us along for months and months with all the bullshit. If you think or know that you can't hit the ship date then don't give the game a ship date until you can actually make it!

Yes, people get very excited about some of these games and it can suck when it gets delayed. Yes it usually ends in a better product but that doesn't keep it from being frustrating. Zelda games being delayed back in the day I remember people being upset. Even though most knew it was good for the game.

I've never cared. Not because I think all delayed games will be better for it, but my backlog is Paul Bunyan-esque so really it's not like I'm starving for new games to play.

@kylenalepa: Duke Nukem Forever is the shining example in my opinion. That stuff was just ridiculous on so many levels.

"It's done when it's done!" Apparently not, Geroge, Apparently not...

@beachthunder: You didn't understand my question. I never said anything about delays resulting in better games. I'm asking about the general consensus among consumers when a game is delayed by a developer in order to clean it up. Whether or not it's actually better has nothing to do with what I asked.

@stonyman65: I agree that stringing gamers along can suck. I wanted Arkham Knight really badly this fall, but I also knew from previews and E3 that it needed more time, especially after what was said on the Bombcast when they revealed it in the spring.

@sodapop7: I remember the internet being sort of in an uproar over the 2005 delay of Twilight Princess because it was clearly to sync the GC and Wii releases on the Wii launch, and they billed it as something else, if I recall. That was pretty shady.

A delay or two "to make sure it's done right" doesn't bother me. As most people seem to say, I'd rather a developer take the time to get it done right than rush out something that has issues. Need an extra few months? Please, take it! I don't want to buy a product that isn't the best that it could be!

But if a developer delays his or her game for more than a year, it's time to get a little apprehensive. Raise an eyebrow at two years. Lower your expectations at three. Four years and you should probably not bother playing it until it's out and you hear something about its quality. It might still wind up being good or even great (Sleeping Dogs!), but chances are it's going to be notably flawed at best.

That is a silly question.

If nobody cared one way or the other than nobody would ever mention it, and for years i've heard people screaming about delays plenty of times.

Yes many people have moved towards the thought that a delay on a game can only be beneficial thanks to extra development time, but I would still call that "Caring" about delays.

Like, nah? I barely ever get games at launch, and I have an endless Steam backlog whenever I'm bored. So 1-12 month delays are rarely something I care about.

Now, if they delay a game by 6 months when I'm like, 90 years old and on my deathbed, I'll be super pissed.

I don't know what Internet you're on where nobody ever complains about delays. Every delay has people complaining.

@ll_exile_ll: Duke Nukem Forever. Hell, it was delayed even after it was picked up by Gearbox.

With all of the broken games being shipped as of late, I'd rather a developer take the time and ensure their game is not infested with They Live monsters like Unity.

As a younger a kid, I was heartbroken each time Twilight Princess was delayed. I only owned a Gamecube at the time and it was all that I was looking forward to.

Would somebody pleeeease think of the children!

@mbradley1992: nice try, George RR Martin

I only care when a game comes out and clearly should've been delayed.

Game devs should take the time they need to ensure a game is at the quality it deserves. That said, for someone in my position who will be a lot more busy and poor come Fall 2015, I do get a little bummed out whenever a game is pushed out of the early months of next year. It's not the end of the world, but it can be a little aggravating when it comes to a game I was looking forward to.

Yeah I remember watching that video that Gearbox put out like "this is a joke, right?" but then I realized they were serious and kind of couldn't believe it. I just shook my head and laughed. Because of course they did. Why would I expect anything less?

Isn't it mostly about your trust in the developer/producer? If you think the project is mismanaged, a delay only signifies further management failures and you probably are running under the assumption that the game would not be any better for it. If you do trust the developer/producer, you trust that they are making the decision because they just need some more time to make the game better, and it's a lot harder to make a stink about that.

In the case of Witcher 3, I have enough faith in CDPR that the delay is justified and nothing to be too angry about.

I used to give a shit when I was younger, had no money, and was super excited for a game. Now I really don't give a shit. At most I'll get slightly bummed, but then go back to playing something else.

Investors care. A three month delay means 3 months more salaries and office expenses cutting into the bottom line. Extra sales from having a better game might not make up for missing the holiday shopping season. And a delay might not even mean a better game; look at Driveclub.

Well, Sleeping Dogs isn't really the best example, as that one had publisher issues (Activision backing away from the True Crime series, and the developer getting bought out, along with the game code, by Square Enix), so there was probably more than a bit of adjustment time needed.

I think the core issue with the whole delay/rush thing is that hype starts so damned early on games nowadays. Ideally, we'd not hear about a game until it was at least in feature freeze, if not until a beta version is ready to show media. That leads to the need to rush and/or people upset at delays. Once people are wound up, it can be hard to tell them to wait even more, no matter how justified it may be.

However, since long, winding hype trains aren't going away any time soon, I think it's up to us to rein in our attachment to unreleased games and let developers and publishers feel confident that we won't turn on them if a release needs to be pushed back a couple times.

Now, multi-year delays, that's an issue at the management level: Either the project lead has lost control of the development, or the suits had a grossly unrealistic timetable for release.

Once I might have minded, but there is ALWAYS something to play nowadays.

Nah. There are so many good games out there that delays make me feel a little relieved. It's hard to find the time to squeeze all this in. My GOG and Steam backlogs are over 100 games deep. My livingroom closet has at least a dozen wrapped games in it.

I welcome any and all delays, frankly.

It's not inherently annoying that a game gets delayed. What's annoying is being told one thing is going to happen, planning on it happening, and having it not happen. In other words, it's promotional material building a hype train that takes a detour that's annoying, rather than a game coming at one time rather than another in and of itself.

Depends on the length of the delay and past history (e.g. The Last Guardian more delays are only bad news at this point)

With my backlog the size it is currently, delays don't bother me much.

Certainly it's going to be at least a bit better than if it wasn't

I have never really cared about delays mainly because I rarely purchase a game right when it comes out. Regardless of when it comes out, it'll probably be another few months or years before I ever get to play the game haha. Struggles of being in school and not have lots of money.

It sucks when games are delayed for like years but just a few months is no big deal to me at all.

As long as the end product delivers and they are honest to the customer base I think it's totally fine. In fact I would rather see this than an underwhelming game that had the potential to be something special, release and flop.

I'd rather have a delayed game then a broken game, but delays are still shitty. Maybe my opinion doesn't line up with playtesting realities but I feel like if you have to delay a game then you announced its release date too soon.

Like they say: They'll remember if it was great, not if it was late.

That said, a delay isn't always going to mean a better product in the end - in fact it can be a red flag that something is going wrong internally. I don't really have a problem with developers taking the extra time they need to finish a game properly, though - we've all seen the kinds of nightmares that occur when a game gets pushed out before its ready (Battlefield, more recently the Masterchief Collection).

here in Australia saints row 4 was delayed for a month less than week before it was ment to be released

Depends on the reasoning. Giving it extra polish is a fine enough reason and we've seen a fair few games this year rushed to market. On the other hand, regular delays sound some alarm bells about a product's quality before its even had a chance. The first of next year is jam-packed, though. Take your time, devs.

Not at all. I would rather wait than buy a broken game.

I'm completely fine with delays. Working in IT I can completely understand how things get off schedule. But when things are delayed and then still released in a bad state, that's when things get very concerning.

I am sometimes disappointed when a game is delayed, but in a lot of cases when one game is delayed, I normally pick up another game i might not have been paying much attention to and it turns out to be great. So in a lot of cases, delays do not bother me at all. As others have said, release a good, fun, stable product and not one that requires constant patching to fix.

A delayed game will be better than its non-delayed counterpart. It will either be less buggy or have more features. I think that qualifies as better? It would take a lot of effort for it to be worse, that's for sure.

Yeah, there was (a little too much) hype surrounding the game and Ubi showing a game play demo before any of the new consoles were even announced kinda did them no favors looking back at it now. To be fair if they didn't show Watch_Dogs that year, they wouldn't even have much to show during that E3. It was probably deliberate in terms of raising their stock during that time and get ahead of the other big publishers.

In the end, the game it ended being (somewhat) like the first Assassin's Creed did. Lots of promise but the game itself ended up being somewhat of a disappointment.

Back on topic, I think if there ended up being a delay for a game with no definite time frame, then I wouldn't complain but I'd probably be worried. In certain cases that there is a definite time frame and release date, then I'd just keep waiting. There's so many games that I usually just wait for certain games' prices to drop before considering buying them. I only buy a number of games at launch anyways (Witcher 3 is going to be one of them for next year).

Shareholders care a lot. I have a few shares in Starbreeze and they lost 30% in a day thanks to their Storm not coming out until 2017. I personally prefer to wait if the game will become a better experience.

I'm still so backlogged from this Fall (thanks Destiny addiction) that I need an open January/February to catch up. I am disappointed in Bloodborne being pushed back but if they need the extra time to polish I'm all for it.

I don't even keep track anymore. I don't really care about the reasons or results anymore either. As I see it release dates are set to help developers meet goals, inform investors, plan marketing and entertain enthusiasts. Considering the history and current state of the industry I'm finding it harder and harder to feel sympathy for people who would still make financial decisions based on promised release dates.

Or maybe it's just easy for me because I've been buried in my backlog since I don't even know anymore. 2008? 2007? Plus I just started WoW again so there's another 3-4 months of build up :P).

Another way of looking at it:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Feature_creep

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scope_creep

I think the decision to delay or not delay really falls under where the developer/publisher needs the game on the financial calendar, especially with large, publicly shared corporations. Usually a game will be better with some delays, and thus probably will sell better, no doubt, but that can matter less when a large part of your goal is to simply release x amount of games per quarter.

Personally, as the King of Neo-Ganja, it can be a bit disappointing when a game I've been looking forward to gets delayed, but at the end of the day, after a few hearty puffs, I prefer it.

So says the Ganja King, in the year 420 of the Great Neo-Ganja Empire, 666th year of Burn's Sleep

Delay's typically don't bother me because I don't play a ton of new games. Hell, Bloodborne getting delayed actually is a good thing for me because that means I have more time to scrounge for a PS4.

As long as there are games I need to play in my backlog, which is pretty much always, delays aren't that big of a deal.

I cared about delays when I was a kid, but not so much as an adult. Too much stuff going on in the present to care.

I suppose it's like Christmas. The period between Thanksgiving and Christmas felt like a lifetime as a kid, now it kind of sneaks up on me.