Posted Fri Oct 9, 2015 at 04:49 AM PDT by Justin Clark
New release dates, price changes, cancellations abound.
It will be a grand day when a genuinely great 8-bit game finds itself on a store shelf instead of languishing in digital, but know that when it happens in a few weeks for Yacht Club Games' 'Shovel Knight', there was no small amount of struggle involved.
To wit, it seems a few compromises have had to be made to get the game out there. For starters, the physical release has been pushed back a little. it's now hitting November 3rd in North America, October 30th in Europe. Not a huge deal, but it happened. The rest is a little less okay.
The big one is that the physical version for Xbox One has been cancelled altogether. Yacht Club were uncharacteristically vague about reasons why, only stating that "publishing policies on that platform that are totally beyond our control" were the cause. Considering the steady trickle of issues pertaining to publishing on Microsoft's platform lately, somehow, this doesn't come as a surprise. The other versions appear to be unaffected, though, with Yacht Club also mentioning they're hard at work trying to figure out how to get a physical version for Vita happening too.
The bit that affects everybody though is the fact that the physical version's price has been raised to $24.99. Yacht Club was able to explain that one in more detail, though, and the reason definitely makes sense: "Although everyone initially agreed to a $19.99 price point, some retailers ran into trouble with limited space to show off their wares, and the rules in place about where games with certain prices are displayed. We didn’t want our ‘bargain priced’ game to go straight to the bargain bin of obscurity, so we had to raise the price."
If it helps ease the pain at all, Yacht Club have offered a small consolation in that the physical copy will now come with a code to go download that fantastic soundtrack by Jake Kaufman. I'd say that's worth an extra $5.
Source: Yacht Club Games
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