DayZ developer Dean Hall’s latest title, Icarus, has been delayed, according to a post on the game’s Steam page. Instead of launching on August 11 as originally intended, the game will instead be available on Steam starting sometime in November.
According to the post, Icarus was delayed “to ensure the game is the best it can be for our players.” Additionally, developer RocketWerkz will be “introducing a longer Beta, which you can play from [August 28].” The game’s first beta will take place on August 28 and 29, placing players in the boreal forest biome, a temperate zone where the only threat is the wildlife.
Subsequent weekends will let players explore more of the game, including its various biomes. It’s worth noting that Icarus betas will only be available to players who have pre-ordered the game.
Icarus is a fair departure from Hall’s previous zombie-filled title. Instead of facing off against the undead and other players, Icarus is a roguelike survival sim that places extra-terrestrial explorers across the planet of Icarus in search of rare and valuable materials. In our preview of the game, we noted that its most unique aspect might be its orientation toward session-based gameplay, in which any structures built on the planet are lost once a mission ends. Likewise, players only keep the items they have on their person between missions and have to start from scratch outside of that small inventory.
That being said, Icarus‘ delay doesn’t come as a huge surprise. During our preview, the game was shown to have multiple optimization issues, along with a slew of game-interrupting bugs.
