Forspoken delayed to October 2022
Square Enix has delayed their upcoming magic-based RPG, Forspoken 5 months. The title is now set to release on October 11, 2022, on the PlayStation 5 and Windows PC.
The developer Luminous Productions made the announcement in a tweet saying, “Our vision for this exciting new IP is to deliver a game world and hero that gamers across the globe will want to experience for years to come, so getting it right is important to us.”
Back in December 2021, Square Enix had released 4 minutes of Forspoken gameplay footage, which was met with poor fan reception, urging the publisher to take down the video as a whole. At the time, many criticised its laggy performance, weird textures, and the general world aspects which looked empty. The enemy AI was also called out for being single-minded and lacklustre in terms of attack variety.
A message from the #Forspoken Development Team. pic.twitter.com/T302V6h4Np
— Forspoken (@Forspoken) March 7, 2022
The studio will now be working towards polishing the gameplay, and is aiming for the “highest quality visuals ever” in an open-world role-playing game. Forspoken was shrouded in mystery for over a year under the working title, ‘Project Athia’ and was scheduled to launch on May 24, 2022.
The plot revolves around Frey Holland, a New York citizen, who gets transported into a fantastical realm called Athia. The botched gameplay had highlighted some of the traversal elements, which included parkour skills and a fluid dash ability that allowed her to thrust onto high areas.
It also offered a look into its inventory system, where donning a particular coloured cloak granted her perks such as increased health, defence, or stamina. The combat mechanics focussed mainly on ranged magic attacks, where she could summon earth elements that explode upon contact, conjure incendiary staffs, and shoot poison darts at incoming hordes. A water bending ability, akin to the cartoon show ‘Avatar’ was also shown at the time.
