Sorry, gamers, PlayStation's God Of War 2 won't be out until 2022
If you were planning on yelling at your son until he killed an animal in some kind of “bad dad simulator,” you’re going to want a seat. God Of War 2, one of the upcoming flagship titles for the PlayStation 5, will be delayed until next year. Earlier today, on the PlayStation Blog, Herman Hulst, the head of PlayStation Studios, announced that the games God Of War 2 and Horizon Forbidden West faced significant delays.
“So we have, currently, two very big, very narrative-driven games in development: Horizon Forbidden West and the next God of War,” Hulst told PlayStation Blog. “And for both of those, they’re frankly affected by access to performance capture and talent. For Horizon, we think we are on track to release this holiday season. But that isn’t quite certain yet, and we’re working as hard as we can to confirm that to you as soon as we can. And for God of War, the project started a little later. So we’ve made the decision to push that game out to next year, to ensure that Santa Monica Studio can deliver the amazing God of War game that we all want to play.”
Thankfully, Hulst acknowledged the arduous labor that goes into putting these titles together, stating that the game’s release wouldn’t come at the cost of his employees. “With these things, something’s gotta give. It cannot be the quality of our titles, and it surely won’t be the health or the wellbeing of our amazing team.”
God Of Wars 2's developer, Santa Monica Studios, also confirmed the delay in a tweet. “Since the release of the next God Of War teaser last year, we’ve been humbled by the amount of love our community has shown us,” the statement reads. “We remain focused on delivering a top-quality game while maintaining the safety and wellbeing of our team, creative partners, and families. With this in mind, we’ve made the decision to shift our release window to 2022.”
It would appear as though the backlash against game studios crunching their employees to meet tight deadlines is making waves. Last year, after another round of delays to Cyberpunk 2077, a series of reports alleged that CD Projekt Red, the makers of Cyberpunk, required employees to work longer hours, including six-day weeks, for more than a year to meet the release date. It looks like the makers of God Of War are trying to avoid those mistakes.