Amazon’s New World gets a last-minute delay following beta

By Andrew Zucosky August 4, 2021

New World, Amazon’s upcoming MMO, has been delayed until September 28. This is the game’s fourth delay, as Amazon had originally pushed it to August 31. The developers explained that the reason for the delay is to incorporate player feedback from the beta.

On Twitter, the official New World account posted about the positive reception the beta had. The social media account claimed that over one million players tried out the beta, accumulating over 25 million hours of playtime. Because of the player feedback that the developers received, they have decided to push the release date of New World to the end of September. The developers apologize for the continued delay but want to assure players that they are focused on the “highest quality game possible at launch.”

A message from the New World team. pic.twitter.com/oAZdK7dxTn

— New World (@playnewworld) August 4, 2021

Notably, New World ran into a particularly nasty issue during its beta tests where the game was reportedly bricking certain graphics cards. The delay announcement doesn’t mention that problem, though it does say that the team is looking to “smash bugs” discovered during the beta.

This will be the second time that New World has been delayed this year, with a total of four game delays. Originally, the game was supposed to be released in spring 2020 but was delayed to August 2020. Because of the pandemic lockdown, the game was delayed a third time to spring 2021. However, the developers decided to delay New World for an August 31 release in order to work on the end-game content.

New World has taken the gaming world by storm. The game has been one of the most-viewed games on Twitch as well as one of the most-played games on Steam during the recent beta access. The game is being developed by Amazon Games Orange County as well as Relentless Studios, a team that is one of the main development divisions under Amazon Games. New World will launch for PC on September 28.

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Street Fighter 6 director reveals World Tour mode’s true purpose

A player stands in Metro City's Times Square equivalent in Street Fighter 6 World Tour.

While Street Fighter 6’s traditional Fighting Ground experience made a solid first impression at Summer Game Fest, its significantly more ambitious World Tour mode is still shrouded in mystery. We briefly got a look at this ambitious mode during the game's State of Play trailer. We see what appears to be a player-created character explore Metro City and other locations from a third-person perspective, breaking boxes and getting into fights with the people he meets.
In the press release for Street Fighter 6, Capcom describes World Tour mode as a "single-player immersive story mode that pushes the boundaries of what a fighting game is and allows players to leave their own legacy with their player avatar." While Capcom isn't revealing more about the mode's moment-to-moment gameplay just yet, I spoke with Game Director Takayuki Nakayama at Summer Game Fest Play Days and learned how World Tour is emblematic of Capcom's goal to make Street Fighter 6 the premier entry point to the fighting game genre.
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In World Tour, players will explore Metro City and other iconic Street Fighter locales with a player-created avatar. Nakayama hopes this experience will strengthen Street Fighter 6's appeal to those who aren't already diehard fans of the series or genre.
"World Tour is a completely different mode that delivers a completely different experience than the traditional fighting," he said. "Even if someone's not a hardcore fan of fighting games, we wanted to incorporate things to make people become fans of Street Fighter outside of the traditional fights."
World Tour certainly looks unlike anything the Street Fighter series has done before. Still, Nakayama hopes that World Tour players will learn more about the world and characters of Street Fighter along the way and fall in love with fighting games as a whole."We want players to dive into this mode and be able to learn how to love fighting games through the things that you do during the journey of World Tour," Nakayama proclaimed. "There will also be opportunities to meet some of the fans' favorite characters, like Ryu and Chun-Li, through World Tour. We want to provide an experience where players can learn more about those characters' backstories and discover what kind of people they are within Street Fighter 6."

World Tour is one of Street Fighter 6's three main pillars, the others being the standard Fighting Ground mode and the multiplayer-focused Battle Hub. He commented how it's always hard to tell how much is enough to put in a game for fans, especially following Street Fighter V's rocky reception at launch due to a lack of content. However, he hopes World Tour provides enough to negate that criticism.
"We were definitely aware of some of the criticism that we faced with Street Fighter 5, and we want to continue to learn from those criticisms and make Street Fighter 6 a better product," he explained. "It's challenging to decide how much is enough for the users, but we continue to work very hard on it and strive to create something that will get appreciation from players."
Still, World Tour seems like it could occupy players for a long time while introducing them to the concept of fighting games and the world of Street Fighter. That's not too shabby of an addition when Street Fighter 6's core fighting game mechanics are already fantastic. And Capcom's goal to make Street Fighter 6 one of the most approachable fighting games ever can be seen outside of World Tour mode.
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During our discussion, Nakayama constantly reiterated that he wants Street Fighter to be something that can entertain and entice those who've never played a fighting game before. Part of the developer's method for making Street Fighter 6 more approachable and accessible is the addition of the Modern Control Type, which allows players to execute flash combos with simple button presses.

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Anyone who's been thinking about sinking tens of hundreds of hours into Amazon's MMO, New World, can give the game a test drive starting today on Steam. Amazon Game Studios is hosting a free weekend for New World, letting players try the game out for a limited time and keep their progress if they decide to buy in.

New World's Steam free weekend started today at 10 a.m. PT and will continue through April 11 at 10 a.m. PT. According to a FAQ for the game's Steam free weekend, players won't be limited in the content they can access. The entirety of New World will be available over the course of the next five days to anyone who wants to see what it's all about via Steam. Players that pick up the game during this time period will also carry all of the progress they make over if they decide to purchase it after the free weekend ends.