Fatshark has announced another delay for Warhammer 40,000: Darktide, the studio’s follow-up to Vermintide. The co-op shooter, previously set for launch in September, has been pushed back to November 30.
This is a delay of over two-and-a-half months, but that’s sadly not the end of the bad news. Fatshark also said that the Xbox Series X/S version will not arrive on the same date with PC, and will instead launch “shortly after.”
The studio shared a statement on Twitter by co-founder and CEO Martin Wahlund, who said the decision to delay the game was hard, but necessary to ensure the day one experience is the best it can be. More specifically, Wahlund cited game stability and performance as two key areas in need of improving. The extra time will also be used to “mature key systems.”
Fatshark’s games have often been criticised for their performance issues at launch, a situation the developer always improved over time. It’s clear the team didn’t want a repeat of this with the launch of Darktide.
There is some good news to come out of this, however. The studio wil be hosting several technical tests and betas ahead of the game’s launch, and it’s opening sign-ups for those interested.
— Warhammer 40K: Darktide (@Darktide40K) July 28, 2022
If you want to play the game early, you can sign up to the playtest at the link. Fatshark said it’s planning to run tests on PC and Xbox, but the initial few will be exclusive to PC because of their technical nature.
You can expect tests to kick off sometime in the middle of August, and continue closer to launch. Your progress will obviously not carry over to the full game, and participants are not allowed to capture or stream gameplay.
Warhammer 40,00: Darktide was initially targeting launch in 2021, before it got pushed to spring 2022, and later to September. Hopefully this will be the last of its delays.