Yesterday we found out that Activision has pushed Soldier of Fortune: Payback back to 2008 in Australia. This flies in the face of the US, which remains full steam ahead for a November launch.
I fired an email off to the publisher for a comment regarding the delay, and their PR has just gotten back to me. Despite the popular belief that it was an OFLC ratings issue (or a typo), the reasons are actually a lot less nefarious – Activision isn’t confident that SoF: Payback will receive its fair share of maketing as the company has quite a few other titles also due for release during the holiday season. And I’m guessing it doesn’t want the game getting lost in the noise. Here’s the full comment:
We decided to move Soldier of Fortune: Payback to early 2008, in order to give the title a more opportunistic launch window. We’re currently working at 110% in getting our Q4 titles to market with the likes of Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare and Guitar Hero 3: Legends of Rock, and therefore moving Soldier of Fortune: Payback puts it in a less cluttered launch window and allows the Activision Australia marketing team to focus the attention to it that it deserves for a successful launch.
We apologies to Australian gamers for the delay.
Thanks for the prompt reply Activision. Bad news if you were desperate to pick this one up, but I can’t imagine that’s many of us.
SoF: Payback Delayed In Oz? [Kotaku Australia]
Juxtapose
Friday, October 12, 2007 at 10:40 AM“Bad news if you were desperate to pick this one up, but I can’t imagine that’s many of us.”
Ooooh, snap. :)
Funky J
Friday, October 12, 2007 at 10:48 AMLogan, I don’t think any title has ever been delayed by the OFLC process.
Logan Booker
Friday, October 12, 2007 at 11:05 AM@FunkyJ: I was pretty sure if, for some crazy reason, there had been an issue with the OFLC, I would have heard about it long before now. Plus, I never suggested in this post or the original that the OFLC was/could be the reason for the delay. A commenter did, though. :)
SpiceMan
Friday, October 12, 2007 at 12:04 PMDelaying the launch doesn’t change its just another Soldier of Fortune game. Can’t see it being a top-selling game, but I’m happy for them to prove me wrong.
Choc
Friday, October 12, 2007 at 1:52 PMIf it’s region free they are stuffed :)
MikeZombie777
Saturday, October 13, 2007 at 8:00 AMI told you it wasn’t because of the OFLC *sigh*
ME
Monday, October 15, 2007 at 4:01 PMWell it looks like I will be downloading it the same day its released
pig
Tuesday, November 13, 2007 at 11:30 AMthis game is gonna rock, sof2 mp was great.
i just preordered it in america to get it early, gettin it in a week’s time.. i live in the uk.
how can u say not many ppl gonna pick this up? it looks as good as CoD 4, and MP prolly gonna be better than cod 4.
Sulph
Tuesday, December 11, 2007 at 3:37 PMRegion free?
What an idiot.