Update: No More Heroes 3 has an official release date, August 27, 2021. The original article appears in its entirety below.
I once met Suda51 at an E3 afterparty in Los Angeles, California. He speaks Japanese and I speak English, so our attempts at having a conversation were futile without a translator around. Since I was several drinks deep by that point, I did what any reasonably drunk human being would do in that situation: I shouted “No More Heroes!” and gave the man a hug.
Suda51, you see, is the creator of the No More Heroes series, which is ridiculous and weird and awesome. Suda’s other works include Killer7, Lollipop Chainsaw, and the free-to-play Let It Die.
So I was pretty excited when No More Heroes 3 was announced for Nintendo Switch with a tentative release date in 2020. Unfortunately, that release date has been pushed back to 2021, according to a tweet by the man Suda51 himself.
In case the image won’t load, or the text is just too darn small, here’s a transcription:
This is Goichi Suda from Grasshopper Manufacture, with an announcement regarding the postponement of the release of No More Heroes 3.
Reading through the comments of fans on social media, we know 2020 has been a very tough period for many of you. To everyone who has been waiting for further news and release date confirmation ever since the reveal trailer for No More Heroes 3 at TGA at the end of 2019, I would like to offer my sincerest apologies.
All staff members at Grasshopper have been working as hard as possible on developing the game in hopes of releasing it in 2020, but the effects of the COVID-19 pandemic have unfortunately proven to be a real body blow to our schedule, causing unforeseen delays in development. Now that we have managed to get back on our feet with development, we have decided to focus on prioritizing quality, and to therefore push back the final release date.
Very sorry once again. We hope that everyone who has been waiting patiently for No More Heroes 3 can understand and accept this decision, and we will continue to put every effort into the title’s development as we shoot for a 2021 release date.
In other and hopefully better news, we are extremely pleased to announce that Darick Robertson — of The Boys fame, and of whom I am personally a huge fan — will be joining the project to provide illustrations for the game. We will be posting some original illustrations, so please be sure to check them out. Please stay tuned for key art from Darick himself, as well as further announcements regarding No More Heroes 3.
SUDA51 [NO MORE HEROES 3 Director]
It’s a bit of a bummer, but it’s better that the No More Heroes team stays safe and they wait to put out a version of the game that truly lives up to the greatness of this wonderfully bizarre game series.
I also hope to see No More Heroes 1 and 2 end up with a physical re-release on the Nintendo Switch at some point as well, but we’ll see. My fingers are crossed.