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Two Worlds II Delayed A Second Time To January 2011
A couple weeks ago, we heard that upcoming RPG Two Worlds II had been pushed back from its mid-September release to October. Now publisher Southpeak has informed us that the game will not make its North American debut until January of next year.
Southpeak released a statement to the community explaining the second delay:
"We understand that this is not great news for those of you eager for an October release and we can understand that you might feel that our European cousins’ potentially getting the game before you is frustrating to say the least. However, there’s a reason for everything and although we feel that the game is truly at ‘AAA’ level, that reason is that we want Two Worlds II to be absolutely flawless when it launches in the North American market. Although we could bring the game to market earlier in order to take advantage of the holiday buying season, we felt that we would do a better service to you by making sure that the game you want is absolutely as it should be. It’s vital to us that we always give you the best possible information and this is the reason that we haven’t commented on the date before now; we did not want to say something to you, only to have that information change once again. Now, we are in a position to confirm the January release date."
So it sounds like the European market may see the game first, but they also may be playing a buggier, less complete version than what will arrive out of the box in North America. A further message asking the community not to pirate or import the game also hints at this:
"For those that have said that they will torrent or import the game because they simply cannot wait, there’s nothing that we can do to stop you. However, please remember that by pirating the game, you are hurting those who worked hard to make the game for you, reducing the chance of another game in the future. By importing the game, you’re paying more money for something that if you can wait, you’ll be able to buy in January at a cheaper price and that will have benefitted from heavyweight Quality Assurance (QA) for the North American market."
As someone who's seen Two Worlds II in action several times now, I have high hopes that Southpeak is making the right decision with this second delay. The bits I've seen are already ages above the buggy mess that was the first Two Worlds. If they're still taking time to polish from there, it seems like there's a chance that Two Worlds II could be one of the most unexpected redemption stories in gaming this generation.
This also places the game firmly out of the end-of-year rush of games. I've always viewed January as a great month for slightly less anticipated games to stand out, and receiving a seemingly huge title like this at the start of the year sounds awesome to me. Here's hoping the extra few months of polish pay off.
Want to know more about Two Worlds II? Check out our Quick 15 video of a preview build of the game and listen to our recent episode of the Game Informer Show podcast where we interviewed Aubrey Norris of Southpeak Games and Jake DiGennaro of Topware Interactive about the game.
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