Yesterday was kind of a strange day for the video game journalism industry at large, as two odd pieces of news hit about a couple of anticipated games: BioShock Infinite and The Last Guardian. One garnered an almost “they sky is falling” type of reaction, and the other was met with a sort of apathy. Let’s look at them, shall we?
First up, BioShock Infinite hit a rough patch yesterday after two key staff members left the project and multiplayer got the axe. Art director Nate Wells and director of product development Tim Gerritsen recently left the project, news which was only compounded by the whole multiplayer fiasco. BioShock Infinite was delayed earlier this year to 2013, and its absence from major trade shows did not go unnoticed.
This was enough cause for alarm that almost every single news outlet declared this the “end times” for Infinite, leaving Ken Levine and Irrational to do a serious amount of damage control. The game is still on track for its February 2013 target and Rod Fergusson, formerly of Gears of War studio Epic Games, was brought on to take Infinite into the home stretch. While this string of events is unfortunate, I doubt tht it’s the major disaster that it was made out to be.
On the other hand we have The Last Guardian, the next game from Team Ico which we haven’t seen in what feels like a couple of years. Sony let the trademark filing for The Last Guardian slip which news sites were quick to brush off as “nothing major”. It’s a sort of odd contrast where one unfortunate event can spur paragraphs the of woe that will betide us, while the trademark expiry of a vaporware game is no big deal. Sony has said that The Last Guardian is still in development, so take from that what you will.
What do you guys think of these two bits of news? Thoughts on BioShock Infinite’s multiplayer trouble? Does the trademark issue for The Last Guardian herald anything? What about the sensationalizing that happened around Infinite while Last Guardian got the brush-off?