Back 4 Blood Delayed To October 12

Back 4 Blood has been pushed to October 12, 2021, a delay of nearly four months from its previous date. In a statement, Turtle Rock Studios said it needs more time to make the zombie co-op shooter. On the bright side, it will be offering another chance at the beta in the meantime.

"Turtle Rock Studios is working hard to make Back 4 Blood the best game it can possibly be at launch and the team needs more time to do this," the studio said in a statement on Twitter. "Therefore, we will release Back 4 Blood on October 12, 2021. We thank our community for its continued support and are excited to share that there will be an open beta this summer."

The release date had previously been set for June 22. This explanation notably does not cite the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic, which has impacted development for many games and studios in the past year.

Turtle Rock hosted a brief PC alpha test last year. It did state at the time that players should "stay tuned for more opportunities to play the game in the future."

Back 4 Blood is Turtle Rock's shot at creating a new property similar to Left 4 Dead, with a team of four players working together to fend off hordes of vicious zombies. You play as a group of humean "Cleaners" fighting against zombie "Ridden." It will sport both cooperative PvE and competitive PvP, the latter of which will have teams taking turns playing as both the Cleaners and Ridden sides. Turtle Rock does see room for improvement on the classic, though, saying it wants to facilitate better teamwork.