We Happy Few Delayed; Developer Removes Option To Pre-Purchase Game

Remember We Happy Few, the BioShock-inspired survival game that entered Early Access back in 2016? Developer Compulsion Games is still working on it, but today it announced that the game's full launch has been delayed until Summer 2018.

Compulsion revealed that the game is now content complete, but it needs a bit more polish and refinement before it's ready to be released. Specifically, the studio is working on implementing "major improvements" to the beginning of the story for Arthur, one of the playable characters in the game.

We Happy Few's producer, Sam Abbott, explained, "There are these moments that are memorable, very funny, and super weird and we're really excited to show you all. But we felt that the first two hours of Arthur's story just didn't live up to those moments, meaning that the game didn't start as well as it should."

In addition, Compulsion addressed feedback from fans who said that the game's Early Access price was too high. The Early Access version has been available to anyone who pre-purchased the game on Steam. Since it's essentially a preorder, Compulsion set this version at $51, the price it expects the final game to cost; as a result, some fans complained that it was too high of a price for an unfinished game.

In response, Compulsion is offering refunds to all Steam players, regardless of playtime. In addition, it is disabling the pre-purchase option on Steam at the end of January and will re-enable it when the game is closer to launch. You can learn more about the current state of the game in Compulsion's developer update video above.

We Happy Few will be available this summer on PS4, Xbox One, and PC. In the game, you assume the role of one of three characters who refuses to take their hallucinogenic "happy pills" and has to somehow break out of the town. Check out some gameplay from We Happy Few in the embed at the top of this article.