The actual biggest game of October, the Shovel Knight devs' Zelda-like Mina the Hollower, gets delayed as devs say it's "so close to being done"

The September Silksong Stampede has come and gone, but indies are still trying to escape a crowded October – though this time, it seems the delay is completely unrelated to the stacked release calendar. Yacht Club Games is delaying its upcoming tribute to Castlevania and Game Boy Zelda, Mina the Hollower, for an unspecified (but seemingly not very long) bit of extra work.

"This week, our team made a tough decision: we decided to delay Mina the Hollower," the devs say in their announcement, appropriately titled Delay Extravaganza II: The Tail Continues. "The entire crew has been working tirelessly day and night to finish development for release on Oct 31st, but we''re just not quite there yet. This isn't a major delay, it's just a stretch of time to apply some final polish and balancing to make the game truly shine."

"We don't want to announce another release date until it's submitted to platforms, so please hang tight as we reach the finish line," Yacht Club says. The studio apologizes to fans in the message, but adds that "we will not waver on our commitment to quality." To that end, they're working on "finalizing design, art, and sound," "overall game balancing," "implementing localization," and, er, "eating cheese." Well, at least the studio's sense of humor is intact.

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Yacht Club is best known for the Shovel Knight series, and Mina the Hollower is a similar tribute to classics of consoles gone by – though this one is a top-down action-adventure with some serious aesthetic similarities to classic Game Boy Zelda titles like Link's Awakening. Add a bit of Castlevania-style Gothic horror and varied subweapons, and Mina has looked like a promising follow-up from the start.

The fact that Mina the Hollower had such an impressive Steam Next Fest demo certainly helps, and as someone who holds the game's inspirations among my most formative gaming memories, it's been my most anticipated indie for ages. I guess I can still hold out a bit longer.

"The game is so close to being done," the devs say. "We're playing it from start to finish every day." Soon, the rest of us will be, too.

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