After delaying Mighty No. 9 into 2016, it looks like the team at Comcept have had to push back the game’s demo, too, which was due out this past Tuesday, Sept. 15.
Keiji Inafune and his team at Comcept have made Mighty No. 9 into one of the most talked-about Kickstarter successes in recent years, but not because of great reasons. The game was originally set to launch this week but, just a few weeks ago, the developer announced that MN9 would be delayed until sometime in 2016.
Delays happen all the time in this industry, but it was the timing of the delay announcement that caused a lot of concern. For starters, it was saved until so close to the original launch date. If the game is being pushed back by a minimum of four months, then the team had to have known a delay was coming earlier than they decided to let the world know about it.
So what was the cause of the delayed announcement? Well, Comcept’s next Kickstarter campaign for Red Ash had not concluded yet. Rather than risk hurting the funding of their next game, it appears as though the creator of Mega Man and his staff decided to keep mum until the final tally was calculated. This was doubly frustrating since Red Ash gained a publisher partway through crowdfunding, another questionable move for the indie developer.
To make up for the delayed launch of Mighty No. 9, Comcept announced that a pretty meaty demo would be made available on Sept. 15. Don’t bother checking your calendar, as that date has come and gone by a matter of 48 hours. Turns out the developer did announce the delay, but in a rather infuriating fashion.
In this recent blog post for the game, Comcept lays out the rules for a couple of ongoing design contests. Then, out of the blue, the post ends with the following aside:
Finally, we know that all of our fans are looking forward to the Special Demo Version we are preparing, and we just ask that you be a little more patient. The team is working on it, but some issues popped up regarding the distribution method so there is a good chance it will not be ready to launch by the 15th. We are really sorry for the inconvenience.
Again, the problem here is with how this message was delivered, as well as the timing. After all of the negative press Mighty No. 9 is getting as of late, Comcept isn’t doing themselves any favors by not being more transparent. We understand that this whole crowdfunding business still requires venturing into mostly uncharted territory, but they’re making some obviously terrible moves and simple mistakes that are bad for the studio, the game and the community’s perception of crowdfunding in general.
So, yeah, I guess the best thing to do is keep waiting and then the Mighty No. 9 demo will magically appear, unless they decide to make a proper announcement for once.
