Alas I received an e-mail promising a couple gifts for the projects backers, and an explanation of the cause of the delay.
Hey Mighties! We know that there are a lot of our fans and especially backers who were disappointed that the Mighty No. 9 release has been delayed from the planned September 15th date. However, we don’t want our backers to be completely empty-handed, and as a result we have a special announcement!
We are releasing an exclusive Trial Ver. for all of our Mighty No. 9 backers!!!
The team at comcept and all of our partners are currently working on solving the online issues with Mighty No. 9, however the single-player content is in a complete state. We would like our backers to have a chance to play the near-complete game, so we are releasing this Trial Ver. which has more volume and functionality compared to the original beta test we conducted. The release of this Trial Ver. is planned for September 15th, so make sure to clear your schedule! We will start sending out codes to our backers a few days earlier than the actual release. This Trial Ver. is planned to run for a full month after release, but will be taken down after that.
Now, let’s take a look at what will be included in the Trial Ver.
Four stages playable from full game. In the beta test we released for backers, it was only possible to play 3 stages which were still under production. For this Trial Ver. we will be including the Opening Stage, No. 1 Stage, No. 3 Stage, and the No. 5 Stage in their complete states! Changes have been made to the content including enemy placement adjustments and an extra layer of polish has been added to the graphics, so even backers who spent time with the beta should also check out this Trial Ver. to see what has changed since then!
Stages will include all relevant cutscenes! In Mighty No. 9, the story will unfold as players challenge and clear new stages. For this Trial Ver. we are not cutting out any of the story content, so all cutscenes related to the stages will also be included! This will give our backers a look into the world of Mighty No. 9 as the various incidents unfold, and allow players to see just how Beck and his crew are dealing with them!
A variety of voice and subtitle options! From the Options menu, players will be able to select the following language options. Text Display: English, French, Italian, German, Spanish, Russian, Japanese Voices: English, Japanese
New game options + Retro Soundtrack! We have also added a few new options thanks to feedback from our backers from the previous beta test. In the Trial Ver. users will be able to toggle options such as the dialogue boxes and AcXeleration UI effects on or off. We have also included the 8-bit soundtrack, which can be turned on in the General Options menu.
Challenge Mode stages 1-6 also playable! On top of the 4 main stages we are including in this Trial Ver., we are also included a small part of the Challenge Mode, which has players take on challenges with a variety of requirements and restrictions. Try them all out, and master your basic Mighty No. 9 skills with this mode!
A special present from Inti Creates: Mighty Gunvolt codes!
With the Steam release of Azure Striker Gunvolt, the 8-bit action game Mighty Gunvolt will also be hitting Steam on September 29th 2015
. Inti Creates is providing all of our Mighty No. 9 backers with a code to redeem the Steam version of the game as special thanks for supporting our project! We will be sending out the codes soon, however the game will not unlock until the release date on Steam.
Finally, the Mighty No. 9 Team would like to apologize once more to our fans and backers regarding the recently announced delay to the Mighty No. 9 release date. We hope that this Trial Ver. of the game will give our backers a glimpse of what the final product will look like. Thank you for all of your support up until now Mighties!
―The Mighty No. 9 Team
So a "Trial' copy of Mighty No.9 with complete versions of the beta stages including a additional stage, and a free steam copy of Azure Strikers Gunvolt. While this doesn't change the fact that we don't get to play another game until perhaps a year after its initial promise date, I hope that they're taking this opportunity to truly learn how to manage their time and resources as a company, and put out a truly amazing successor to a video game series. Most companies would avoid any delays and launch a broken game with the plan to patch the bugs in the future, but I'm glad that it's at least Comcept's desire not to follow the trend.
So what do you think, was Azure Strikers Gunvolt and the Trial version a worthy apology, or should Comcept have just released the full copy and work on ironing the remaining issues in patches? I know while I'm personally disapointed, I'm happy to know that the delay will only make the game better. I rather have an amazing game straight out of the disc than having a broken launch that EA is infamous for.
