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You've seen the aftermath – indie developers scrambling to delay their games, praying they'd avoid the cannonball that was the random Hollow Knight: Silksong release date. It wasn't very nice, was it?
"I mean, they're allowed to do what they did. There's no laws or rules against that," Hell is Us creative director Jonathan Jacques-Belletête tells Skill Up (spotted by This Week in Video Games) about the way Team Cherry abruptly announced its latest Metroidvania's launch date, after fans had been waiting years to play. Out of nowhere, he learned it was going to release on the same day as his Souls-ish action game. "I don't want to [...] say, 'Oh, they caused this to us, or somebody else.' Like, I don't really care about that. I don't want to get into that type of debate."
Still, Jacques-Belletête maintains that "when you know you're that big," as Silksong developer Team Cherry must, "I think a shadow drop is a bit like, 'Wow'" – especially if other studios consider your game the "GTA 6 of indie."
"People who are in the industry, that's already how we were calling such a game," Jacques-Belletête explains. "To shadow drop something like this is a little callous."
In any case, Jacques-Belletête is glad Hell is Us developer Rogue Factor and publisher Nacon stood their ground and kept the game's September 4 release date, despite the fact that Silksong was about to roll through September 4 like a tank.
"We were also like, 'No, I think we can get through the storm,'" Jacques-Belletête recalls. "The thing nowadays, honestly, getting a window where you're pretty much alone is almost impossible. I remember like, you know, 15 years ago… and kind of like, mid-end of summer was always like a dead period. But it's just no such things anymore. It's just constant madness."
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