Damn Ashcraft. I was just thinking about Duke and you go and put it in your article. Foiled again!

This isn't a playstation 3 game though.

His comment makes as little sense to me as does the thought of brushing my teeth with a street sign.

All the major hits were significantly delayed? How 'bout, like... name one! MGS 4 was delayed by about a year. Mass Effect was delayed by a few months. Others have been delayed but by that amount or less. Gears of War? Was that delayed at all? Or Halo 3? I don't seem to remember that ever having a release date other than the one that it came out on. I could just be forgetting about that, though. Call of Duty 4? Was that ever delayed? I don't remember there be delays for any of those. Bioshock? Was that ever delayed? If my memory isn't serving me properly, please, somebody, refresh me. But Even if all those major hits were delayed, it was a minimal delay compared to what Too Human's gone through. I still look forward to the game, but his comment doesn't seem to make sense to me, and I don't see how it's beneficial to say publicly. Will it influence people to buy the game? Not that I could imagine. Will it make it any less damaging if the game flops? No. So what's the point?

@Sparx:
I'll let you get the next round.

@sUKi:
Yes. And...?

@sUKi:

I'm taking it that at some point, continuing development required continued funding, and Microsoft likely stepped in and pledged their support in exchange for exclusivity.

Then again, they took so long making it, they might not have even wanted to think about trying to code for the PS3 after all of that, and just went with the dominate platform at the time.

Another example of a long delay didnt help the game all that much was STALKER. D:

Since it still was filled with all sorts of weird bugs and such. :x

Considering how bad it looked, I think the delay was wise. I wish more companies would hold back their games until they are actually, you know ... complete.

@baked ham: Smash Bros! That was minorly delayed. . .

What game was delayed by more than couple of years that didn't do well (or did do well, for that matter) ?

I'm sure there are some but I'm drawing a blank here. Probably something for the PC? Hmm...

@PapaBear434: Well Microsoft is the publisher of Too Human, so I'd say that it was Microsoft money and exclusivity that allowed this game to get finished as such.

Yeah, all the "big hits" were delayed - within reason. Too Human is falling into that "Prey" range - something that is in development forever, is still failing to blow people away even this close to release, and will likely pass through the collective gaming consciousness faster than a fart on a windy day.

@baked ham:
Yah, I thought that was pretty common knowledge. T_T
I'd point that out to make sure everyone's on the same page!

@jayntampa: I wish Edios did that with most of their games, since too many come out well half baked. :x

Kane & Lynch was a good example reciently. D:

I guess on a more positive note a game that was delayed and managed to turn out better than expected was EAs Army of Two though.

Over all with delays there needs to be a fair bit of balance though, since overly long delays start to build a false sense of the game will be awesome, due to the delays. Kinda setting themselves up for disappointment or somethin you know.

@baked ham:
S.T.A.L.K.E.R.:Shadow of Chernobyl was originally announced in 2001, came out last year. Never played it, but it did OK for a recent PC game, didn't it?

In general I don't think long delays are always bad...just don't show anybody a demo until you're in striking distance of release, is the lesson here. Dennis is still smarting from showing a bad demo a couple years ago.

I do think the "prepared for death" talk is a bit fatalistic, and short sighted. If SIlicon Knights doesn't already have a backup plan in case Too Human flops, then they will die sooner than later. :P

Daikatana?
Timeshift?
(insert decent rating ps3 exclusive here)?
Unreal Tournament 3?

Which kind of delay is it Dyack? I hope none of the above, i have hopes that this game will be as advertised.

Having worked on the retail side, a ridiculous number of games have been delayed ... I think the quote Dyack pulls from Miyamoto in the article is pretty accurate.

On a side note, why has the Kotaku banner at the top stopped leading me back to the front page. I get lost without it! :(

I dunno whether it's a lack of sleep or Dyack's metaphors, but after reading his comments, I feel woozy.

@jayntampa: Really? It works fine for me in Firefox? D:

Does this mean that with Dr. Dyack (Doak) ready for death he'll brave the mighty strongholds of Nintendo and Microsoft and release Goldeneye on Xbox Live at last?
Also he already proved his lack of fear for death when he infiltrated the facility, posed for months as a scientist all so he could pass vital technology onto the British Secret Service.
The man's a hero.

Daikatana was delayed...and the three of us who played it know how great THAT was.

@baked ham:

It's early in the morning, give me a break.

Going to go play some Warhawk and wake myself up.

I have to toss a few cents into the circle here. I'm sorry, but the combat looks hilarious. Not so much the gunplay, that's alright. But the melee combat is ridiculous. Your avatar literally ice skates across the arena to strike a foe, and if you target multiple enemies in sequence, it looks like figure skating. Basically, it's an unattractive animation. Can somebody argue otherwise?

@Witzbold: Yeah, I use Explorer at work and at home, and I can no longer click on the Kotaku -- ever since all the screwy stuff happened yesterday. I thought it might be my home computer, but it's still like that now that I'm at work.

@Islandkiwi:

One of my favorite quotes about that game came from the PC Gamer magazine review.

He obviously gets a big discount on Evil Cyber-Frogs when he buys them in bulk from the distributor; the first few levels are packed to the brim with the damn things. When you turn a corner, you will find an evil frog. When you open a door, you will find more evil frogs. Blast open a wall, and chances are very good that evil frogs are awaiting your appearance.

After an hour of nuking cyber-Kermits and trudging through what looks like a terrible Quake II user mod...

Ah, PC Gamer, you used to be such a great mag... What happened to you?

The man always strikes me as a sort of Michael Scott of the game industry. Spouting off about philosophy like that of Nietzsche and how it is a major part of a videogame that, for all I can see, involves hacking and slashing enemies a la Diablo, discussing how he's a Samurai...it's embarrassing.

Oh, and speaking of PC Gamer, I managed to find another game that was rich with delays and promises of it's developer.

I present to you all Battlecruiser Millennium.

Seriously, if you thought John Romero's fall from grace was bad, take a look at this game and Derek Smart. A guy that makes Jaffe look calm and well reasoned.

@PapaBear434:

Oops, I meant BattleCruiser 3000AD. that was the bad one. This was the sequel.

Equally a flop, but not for the same reasons.

@vanderblade: Well, they did start development with the Unreal Engine 3 (even though things eventually went south with Epic), so it's no real surprise that there's ice-skating involved. Not much of a problem with, say, Lost Odyssey, but a fair bit more annoying in an action games.

@SpiralJacobs: Michael Scott, ha-ha! You are so right that I almost feel a little sad for the guy... I'll be expecting "that's what she said" jokes in his future interviews.

@PapaBear434:

Derek Smart doesn't care. He's independently wealthy and spends his time making the games he feels like making. If someone besides him enjoys them, then so much the better. Otherwise, he's got nothing to lose and he's having a good time.

@KaneRobot: LOL! It's a shame really because the movies we've seen so far look great from a graphics standpoint, it's the combat that looks uninspired to me and I still don't quite get what the story is behind all the violence. That being said, Too Human isn't even close to being on my radar. If someone gave it too me I'd probably sell it or trade it for store credit without even playing it. I just don't care about it anymore.

@SpiralJacobs: Agreed, it smells like he's preparing for the shitstorm that's going to come if the gaming collective says "Too Human is teh suxor!" Sorta like the Lair debacle..."Reviewers didn't understand what they were playing, Lair doesn't blow...honest...you guys just didn't get it..."

@vanderblade: Ziiiiiing! I was thinking the exact same thing ever since I've seen the combat. That's a deal breaker for such a game. Image a Ninja Gaiden or a God of War with silly combat and bad animation. It'd get ripped to high heaven.

This game is reason #2 that I have an Xbox, with Mass Effect being number #1--Honorable mention to Bioshock. Everything else I can live without (you know...like the errors.)

it didn't take that long for halo to be released after it was announced, neither did COD4, God of War, Gears of War, Mario Galaxy etc. I could go on and on. Really if they could just settle with an idea and stick with it this guys seem like they're too insecure that their game doesn't have an example is magic like other games so they added it, then it's a little too old so they made it futuristic, just stick with an idea I really wanna see this game.

@Striderhayasa - Phillyyakk on PSN and Live.: "Too Human isn't even close to being on my radar."

No shit? lol. You're always taking your snide fanboy shots at anything 360 related, like we all buy that you had any sincere interest in Too Human.

I could give a shit about delays, it's not like its vaporware. If you watch those dev diaries, you know they have something really special here.

Yeah, it really seems like he's preparing for the backlash when people play it and watch weird Norse/Japanese mashup cutscenes that play too long, get tired of weird controls and a bad camera, and find out the game really has nothing insightful to say about philosophy or mythology at all.
Seriously, just read the first paragraph of the second section, the bit about Bushido, and picture Michael Scott saying it, with Dwight hovering behind. It's perfect.

I shudder to think about the insane amount of money will be spent on hyping this game.
Too Human Energy Bars, Boxers, Special Edition Samurai Sword box set......

Ok I would probably jump in for that last one.

This is some really obtuse logic. You know its getting to the point where its obvious someone needs to dispatch a team of PR people to monitor Dyack at all times. He is single handedly destroying this games rep. I can understand that this is his magnum opus and as such he wants to defend it, but thats the thing. If this project is going to decide the legacy of Dyack and the fate of SIlicon Knights then he needs to stop blogging and interviewing and instead focus on making this supposed trilogy the best it can be or else it will go the way of the dodo and Advent Rising.

I thought the first interview he did with EGM after they blasted the demo shwon at E3, while being a little unnecessary, was ok. It showed he had a passion for his game and cared. Thats good. But just last month he did a follow up interview and now these comments. Its too much. This is becoming less and less about Too Human and more and more about Dyack and his fragile ego. Someone at MS needs to call Dyack and tell him "Look youre not a very likeable guy to begin with. Youre not a Bungie guy or someone like that. Just make your game and shut up". Whether he wants to believe it or not his game will ultimately be judged by gamers and gamers are can change their tastes. If a game is good its good at it will sell. Its not like MS isnt going to market the hell out of this either. But he's making it harder by drawing the attentionaway from the game and putting on his personality. Games that get delayed are always good? Thats great research. Why dont you make one game thats great first, make a Halo or other title that he keeps name dropping, and THEN make a statement like this. You made Eternal Darkness so far. Shut the hell up.

I think they've have put too much effort on this game. In my opinion, I don't see this game as a best-seller.

I think this looks piss-poor, not my cuppa tea at all, delay it all you want, doesnt bother me!!!

Yet initial screenshots did look good, having seen the rolling video on the marketplace im very dissapointed.....

Their most recent reveal of this game was not very impressive at all.

TimeShift is the game that springs to mind when thinking about games that were delayed heavily and went through several different builds before being released. That didn't turn out so well.

Still, I'm pumped for Too Human.

@PapaBear434: Sorry if I offended you. Didn't mean anything by it, I just figured you weren't aware so I was filling you in.

Dyack's reaction to the bad E3 showing of, what is it, two years ago now, really turned me off to this game. He and Jaffe are two developer personalities I really can't stand. Someone doesn't think Calling All Cars is game of the year, and Jaffe bitches about reviewers who don't understand the type of game he was making.

The press pans a really crappy demo of Too Human, and Dyack complains that showing preview code is ridiculous and unfair to developers, because it's not finished. Ok, Dennis, you've got a point there. But right after he says that, it's suddenly "Too Human Week" on IGN, and there's Denny-D giving an exclusive interview about his upcoming game.

Way waaaaay overdue like Duke? Bad thing, people forget your game.

But still, give me a late game over an unfinished game any day! It's not like I have nothing else to play right now anyway!

I'm personally hoping that Too Human does good so Dyack and Silicon Knights can get around to bringing out Eternal Darkness 2.

Im part of the DNF cult. We still believe.

What a jackass. His comments didn't seem confident, they seemed ignorant. It will get released, flop and they'll work on Too Human 2 PT Deux Chapter two.

@baked ham: Well, you could take Team Fortress 2. Do you remember its original iteration from 1999?

+ Watch video

Almost a decade later, TF2 certainly gained a lot from its absurdly lengthy development time.

I've never heard of this game before...

He didn't say long delays make a game a big hit, he said that of games that ended up being big hits they all experienced delays. That's not the same thing.

Kotaku Comments: 95% homogeneous.

I'm looking forward to this game. I'm a sucker for Norse mythology.

I hope this game fails super bad. Only so that developers will put game out if they think it's worth making, not delay it for decades.

Too Human will do just fine. I'm not expecting it to be ground-breaking or precedent setting, just very entertaining.

I also am looking forward to a sequal to Eternal Darkness.

Ok, Ashcraft dude, we all know that you've got a stick up your bum regarding SK, and you like to make petty posts about the guy, but taking an interview and quoting him out of context to make him look like an ass is just sad. WTF dude?

Dennis wasn't the one saying that all big hits are delayed, the Gamasutra editor stated that in one of his questions, where he was referencing the Blizzard conference in which they outlined killed projects. [kotaku.com]

Here is a quote from the article:

"Gamasutra:Yeah. Well, I mean, it's really, people are definitely afraid to kill stuff. But it's funny, because people ask, for instance, Blizzard -- I don't know if you saw their talk...

DD: I did; I liked it. Yeah.

Gamasutra: They asked them why their games are always good, and it's because they only release the good ones. And someone during the Visual Fight Club... he was saying that if you look at all of the successful, blockbuster, really good games, they were all delayed and late. Like, they were all finished when they were done. They tried to meet a ship date, but, you know, it wasn't the guiding principle.

DD: ...I didn't know that, that all the major hits had been significantly delayed... "

Come on dude, I expect higher reporting integrety than that.

They should just forget the Too Human series and make another Eternal Darkness game. Now that game was probably one of the best games I've played this decade. Nothing beats a game that messes with your mind as you play along.

What a terrible an