Both The Last of Us Part II and Ghost of Tsushima have new release dates as of a new post from PlayStation.Blog. Naughty Dog’s followup to its 2013 hit will launch June 19, and Sucker Punch’s samurai adventure will release on July 17.
“As our teams at Sony Interactive Entertainment and Worldwide Studios approach development milestones and confront a world changed by COVID-19, we find ourselves having to adapt to today’s ever-changing environment,” reads the blog post. “Amidst some disruptions to our working styles, we wanted to provide an update to PlayStation gamers who are eager to learn when our next exclusive titles will arrive to PlayStation 4.”
Sucker Punch may have needed to delay with or without a global pandemic as it put out an explanation on a Twitter thread. The studio goes into depth about it still needs to polish and clean out any glitches that linger throughout its upcoming PlayStation exclusive.
As you may have seen, Ghost of Tsushima is moving out just a few weeks to July 17.
There have certainly been challenges in adapting to game development in a Work From Home environment, but thanks to an incredible effort by our worldwide team, Ghost is nearly ready for release…
— Ghost of Tsushima 🎮 July 17 (@SuckerPunchProd) April 27, 2020
While this is the first release delay for Ghost of Tsushima, The Last of Us Part II has moved plenty of times with its February release to May then to an indefinite launch due to COVID-19 until the latest date. Sony ran into issues due to physical copies not being able to be sold with Gamestop and other retailers being shut down around the world. It is unclear how the company will get around this issue, but due to TLoU 2 spoilers leaking online, it makes sense for this push for a June launch.
The Last of Us Part II will follow five years after the first game’s events. It will focus on Ellie as the playable protagonist as she goes down a road of revenge for an unknown cause that a teaser in the latest trailer.
Ghost of Tsushima will mark Sucker Punch’s first title since 2014’s Infamous Second Son. The studio has made its name off of the superhero styled franchise and the PS2 classic Sly Cooper trilogy. You can currently check out the story trailer to see what’s to come in this samurai action-adventure.