Sega unveiled Sonic Rumble, a PC and mobile party game brought to us by Sonic Team in collaboration with Sega Europe subsidiary Rovio Entertainment, which while the name itself may not ring a bell, you've no doubt played at least one of their games. The studio is the one that brought us Angry Birds, as well as Sugar Blast and Bad Piggies.
Sonic Rumble had its release poised for May 8, but things have changed and they've made changes that "will fundamentally reshape" the game and they want to keep the game fun for years on. So, to accomedate the vision, they've decided to pull the reigns back a bit and consider a new release date.
"These upcoming changes will fundamentally reshape the game, and one thing has become clear: We want to create a game that evolves and stays fun for months and years to come. To build the kind of high-quality, long-lasting Sonic game our players deserve, we need more time.
As a result, we’ve decided to postpone the Global Launch. We know this news may be disappointing, and it wasn’t a decision we made lightly. We at SEGA share that disappointment, especially because we’re making this call so close to the launch timing we had originally hoped for. However, we believe taking this extra time is the right choice for the future of Sonic Rumble."
They haven't put forward any potential new release date. There will be a Q&A on Discord at 6 AM PDT tomorrow that will see the team answering questions relating to new features, the delay itself, and what they're doing moving forward.
Sonic Rumble's billed as a 32-player party game releasing to PC, Android, and iOS. The basic premise sees Sonic the Hedgehog and co battling against Dr. Eggman’s “twisted toy world.” Characters like Amy Rose, Tails, Shadow the Hedgehog, Rouge the Bat, Knuckles, and more are all characters you can expect, alongside cosmetics that players can unlock. It's been compared to games like Fall Guys with game modes like Ring Survival, where players compete to see who can collect the most rings, obviously, this being a Sonic game, there has to be a racing element, as well as Co-Op Battles, where you have to beat bosses.
While we're sure Sega won't just reveal a new release date as soon as someone asks during tomorrow's Sonic Rumble-centered Q&A, it's not the worst thing for Sega to pull release dates back a bit. Sega's games, especially Sonic-branded games, have a bit of a mixed reputation, so a strong initial release is always advised.