Deus Ex: Mankind Divided, the sequel to Deus Ex: Human Revolution, has been delayed until August 23rd, 2016.
The reasoning for the six-month delay is explained in a short blog post on Deus Ex Universe. Head of Studio at Eidos-Montreal, David Anfossi, wrote the team was satisfied with the progress on Mankind Divided, but wanted to take extra time in post-production to release the game in a satisfactory state.
To me, this delay is complicated by the “Augment Your Pre-order” program Eidos-Montreal released in February of this year. In the program, players would be able to contribute to a Kickstarter-esque tier system that unlocked rewards once monetary goals were met. The last tier in Augment Your Pre-order was Deus Ex: Mankind Divided releasing four days early globally. And this is where I ask the obvious question, how does a game that was supposed to be released four days early get delayed six months?
The delay highlights why the Augment Your Pre-order campaign was such a bad marketing move; game development is unpredictable and difficult. Manipulating your excited fanbase by enticing them with an early release date that Deus Ex: Mankind Divided presumably wasn’t going to hit is nefarious to say the least. Fortunately, Augment Your Pre-oder was canceled after a tremendous amount of bad press about the program.
In an era of games being released broken, it’s nice to see a team taking a substantial amount of time to release a game that hopefully works at launch. Take as long as you need, Eidos-Montreal. Be the example for which the video game industry follows.
