Game Delays Got Even Worse as the Pandemic Progressed, But Studios Grew

A GDC survey of over 3000 games industry professionals revealed that game delays have gotten worse as the pandemic progressed, but many game studios have also grown in tandem. The Game Developers Conference 2021 State of the Industry Survey notes that 44% of the developers it spoke to said they had a game delayed during the pandemic. This is up on last summer's survey, which reported that 33% (or a third of all game developers) had delayed a game due to the impact of COVID-19. While many of those delays will be internal, we've seen a large numbe rof games publicly shift their dates already this year – check out every game delay announced in 2021 so far. [ignvideo url="https://www.ign.com/videos/2020/08/12/halo-infinites-delay-is-the-right-movebut-a-painful-one"] Yet at the same time, almost half of game studios have also grown considerably. 47% of studios surveyed said that they had expanded their staff over the past year, and 66% said that productivity and creativity had stayed the same or even increased. This suggests studios are starting to adapt to working from home - 41% of those who responded to last year's survey said that productivity had been damaged by the move to remote working conditions. You can view the results of the full survey here, which is available as a free download. In the same survey, it was revealed that the PS5 is the most popular console to develop for, while PC remains the most popular platform for developers overall. This survey lands ahead of the Game Developers Conference 2021, which will occur between July 19-23 as an all-digital event, for the second year in a row. [poilib element="accentDivider"] Jordan Oloman is a freelance writer for IGN. Follow him on Twitter.