2025 has been a pretty big year for games. It brought us a ton of highly anticipated games, from Vampire: The Masquerade – Bloodlines 2 to Hollow Knight: Silksong. We also finally got the Switch successor console and a new Mario Kart game to go with it. But along with the big ups, we have a few major letdowns. And many of those came in the form of delays for some games that many of us were looking forward to finally playing in 2025.
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Game delays are always disappointing, even when fans are understanding about the studios needing more time. Having a game get pushed back, especially after having a specific release date to look forward to, is a letdown. And 2025 brought some major disappointments, from my personal most anticipated game of the year to one of the biggest franchises of all time. Here are the 5 most devastating game delays we saw this year.
5) Paralives (Early Access)
Many fans have grown increasingly disappointed with The Sims 4. With ongoing glitches and pricey expansion packs, many life sim lovers were looking forward to seeing a true alternative emerge. With inZOI demanding a bit too much for many casual gamers’ PCs, Paralives became the hopeful contender for a competitor to the Sims franchise. And earlier this year, the game set its Early Access launch date for December 2025.
Alas, it wasn’t meant to be. On November 14th, the team behind Paralives shared the upsetting news that the Early Access release would be delayed. Now, the game is expected to arrive in Early Access on May 25th, 2026. That gives the indie studio more time to ensure its life sim is truly polished and ready for fans to experience it for the first time. But for those of us who’ve had our eyes on this game for a while, it is definitely sad to have to wait even longer to play it.
4) Witchbrook
Cozy gamers were shocked and thrilled when Witchbrook emerged from a years-long silence at the Nintendo Direct earlier this year. And with a winter 2025 release window, no less! After so much waiting, many of us were excited to finally see what this magical pixel art life sim has to offer, especially after that stunning new trailer.
But alas, after the game continued to skip opportunities to nail down its release date, Witchbrook got the formal delay I was dreading. The game now has a vague 2026 release window as the team continues to work on the witchy life sim. My bets are that we’ll be waiting on this one for a while yet, but I really hope it’s worth the wait.
3) Fable
For fantasy RPG lovers, the Fable reboot has been a hot topic. The original Fable series was one of the best Xbox franchises around, and early looks at the spiritual successor have been fairly promising. In a new 2024 trailer, Fable nailed down a 2025 release window. But like many other big games this year, it wasn’t meant to be.
After months of rumors, Xbox Game Studios confirmed that Fable is now expected to release in 2026. We still don’t have an exact release date, and some speculation suggests that next year might not be in the cards for the fantasy RPG, either. But at any rate, those of us who were looking forward to a Fable return in 2025 are sad to learn we’ve got a longer wait in store.
2) Marvel 1943: Rise of Hydra
It’s been a tough year for Marvel fans who were looking forward to Marvel 1943: Rise of Hydra. Back in May, the game was delayed from its initial 2025 release window to “early 2026.” That alone would’ve been a disappointment, as we haven’t had a big narrative Marvel release for console since 2023’s Marvel’s Spider-Man 2. But the bad news didn’t stop there.
In November, Skydance Games shared the update no one wanted to hear. Rise of Hydra has been delayed yet again. The game is no longer expected in early 2026, and in fact has no release window attached to it at all. This puts the very future of the project in question for many fans, who now worry we could never see the game at all. For now, though, it looks like we’ll just be waiting an unknown amount of time for Marvel 1943.
1) GTA 6
Of course, it’s probably no one’s surprise that this game earns the top slot for most devastating game delay of 2025. Fans have been waiting over a decade for the sequel to GTA 5, and GTA 6 is widely considered the most anticipated game of all time. The wait has become a meme at this point, with fans spouting off “we really got x before GTA 6” at regular intervals. But that wait was supposed to end this year with the game’s supposed 2025 release window.
In May, we got a new trailer for the game, but also the news fans had been bracing to hear. GTA 6 was delayed from 2025 to May 2026. But the bad news unfortunately didn’t stop there. In November, Rockstar confirmed that the highly anticipated game is now slated for fall 2026. With so many delays already, many fans are bracing for more bad news about the game. Hopefully, fall 2026 is the true and final release window for GTA 6, but we’ll have to wait and see.
What game delay disappointed you the most this year? Leave a comment below and join the conversation now in the ComicBook Forum!
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