Sharin no Kuni: the girl among the sunflowers for PS Vita canceled

It is with great regret that we have decided to announce that while last minute adjustments to the development and production schedule with all parties involved have taken place until very recently, it was confirmed as early as the week last that one of the main awards for this project, the PS Vita version of the game (both physical and digital), will not be able to meet the deadline for its production. As such, we will cancel and refund, or exchange the PS Vita version of the game for a PC for all eligible contributors and pre-order in-store buyers.

We sincerely apologize to our supporters who are looking forward to playing the game despite the repeated delays.

Please note that we will not be accepting cancellations for the PC game version at this point as we believe it will be released and delivered successfully.

Details on the cancellation of the PS Vita version

We believe that we need to be as open as possible about the circumstances that led to the cancellation of the development of the PS Vita version of the game, and as such, we will share with our supporters the circumstances that led to this point.

From the start, the development schedule for the PS Vita was impacted by delays due to the development of the PC game version, but here we will focus on the developments of the last year and a half after the change of publisher.

In the July 2019 update, we announced that our publisher agreement with Limited Run Games (LRG) has been dissolved and we will be working from that point on with Hong Kong-based publisher Eastasiasoft Limited. The reason for this change was to avoid the problem of the end of manufacturing of PS Vita in North America in the same year. The project team knew that by changing the publisher to a different region the manufacturing time would also change, so we outsourced the pre-production and game development of the PS Vita version to a certain development company that has a license to develop PS Vita games. , and rearranged the schedule to meet the deadline.

While the COVID-19 pandemic and the changes it has made to workplaces around the world have affected this timeline, full game baseline data was expected to be delivered by October 2020 at the latest.

However, at the last minute this date was changed and the game was not delivered to us in October due to circumstances with the development company, and the project team was unable to confirm the product. real before November. Even more problematic than this was the fact that the game had been confirmed to have numerous bugs, including fatal flaws, at this point, and additional development time was inevitable.

However, even at this point and during all this time, we had repeatedly asked the development company for a clear deadline for mastering the PS Vita version in order to manufacture the cartridges by the end of the year. We established a build schedule for production through discussions with Eastasiasoft, shared this information with the development company, and the development company responded that they plan to meet that deadline.

Until the very last moment, the project team still believed that production of the game was going to end and enter the manufacturing phase, but in the end, the multiple issues that continued to emerge during development and overtime needed to resolve each of them resulted in the developer not being able to meet the time frame discussed with Eastasiasoft. We are currently negotiating the liability issues arising from the contractor’s failure to meet the development deadline.

Even after last year’s delivery date, throughout January, the project team had researched and researched alternative methods through various channels, including Eastasiasoft, but in February it became clear that we were to abandon production of the PS Vita. version, and that’s why we’re making this announcement.

One thing we want to make clear is that the development timeline and estimates we have reported in the updates and comments so far have never been wrong – they were always based on the information that was shared with us. during our meetings with the development company that we outsourced the project to. We thought we could deliver the PS Vita version of the game to everyone until the very end.

As you can see, the direct cause for the cancellation of the development of the PS Vita game version was the late delivery date of the development contractor, but the final responsibility for the situation, including the management of the entrepreneur, is the responsibility of the project team. , or to be more precise, Frontwing, who is the main organizer of the project and in charge of managing the development.

We would like to clarify that AKABEi SOFT2, Eastasiasoft Limited, Limited Run Games and Tokyo Otaku Mode Inc., which have already been mentioned as members of the project, have no role or responsibility in the delay or cancellation of the game, including the PS. Vita version. Please do not contact these companies individually with any complaints or inquiries.