Bloodstained, a Kickstarted game from former Castlevania head Koji Igarashi, will not be releasing until 2019, Igarashi as announced. Additionally, the game will not be releasing on the PlayStation Vita as originally planned.
While the target date for the game was 2017, it slipped to 2018 after original developers Inti-Creates were taken off the project. Inti-Creates still continued work on the NES-styled prequel Bloodstained: Curse of the Moon, while Igarashi’s employer ArtPlay continued developing the title. Today the game was officially delayed to 2019, confirming suspicions that it would not make it out this year.
When the Kickstarter campaign was launched, Igarashi included Wii U and Vita stretch goals, despite neither system supporting Bloodstained’s use of Unreal Engine 4. ArtPlay contracted Armature studio, former Retro Studios developers that made games like Arkham Origins: Blackgate and Recore, to port Unreal Engine 4 to the two older systems and thus allow the game to work there. The Wii U version was cancelled in favor of the Switch last year, but the Vita port remained at the time.
Igarashi reasoned that development on the Vita version no longer made sense, especially since Sony was discontinuing the portable system. As such, Vita backers can receive a refund or switch their choice to another one of the game’s versions.
The game was crowdfunded in May 2015 a little while after Igarashi left Konami. It is currently releasing on PlayStation 4, Xbox One, Switch, and PC.
Source: Game Informer Bloodstained Delayed To 2019, Vita Version Cancelled