Those of you looking forward to playing Hunter x Hunter Nen x Impact are going to have to wait a while longer, as the game’s just caught a delay.
Earlier this year, fighting game developer Eighting announced with Bushiroad Games that it would be developing a Hunter x Hunter fighting game, much to the delight and slight trepidation of fans of the series. It was also supposed to be released sometime this year, but unfortunately earlier today publisher and Guilty Gear Strive developer Arc System Works shared that Nen Impact has been delayed to the very vague release window of 2025. This obviously won’t be welcome news to people looking forward to adding a new fighting game to their ever growing list of titles they’ll swear they get good at one day, but it’s not all bad news.
In a statement, Arc System Works explained: “We sincerely apologise for the trouble caused by this delay to the players who are looking forward to the game’s release. This delay is so that we will be able to implement rollback netcode for release… We made this decision out of concern that players would not be able to fully enjoy the game in a state where some players would encounter issues with online play, given the nature of fighting games. The release date will be announced at a later time. We appreciate your understanding, as we continue to work to provide the best game possible.”
For those that don’t know what rollback netcode is, it’s essentially a system that treats all your and your opponents inputs as having happened immediately, to make it as close to local, offline play as possible. Games like Super Smash Bros. Ultimate have delay-based netcode, meaning if you have a bad connection, and you press a particular button, it might not happen in-game immediately. This is how things used to be for most fighting games, but with such a push towards online-play in recent years, more and more fans have been calling on fighting game developers to add in rollback netcode, even into older games.
Essentially, this is bad news for your immediate happiness, but great news for your delayed happiness. Our own Connor went hands-on with the game back in July, and really enjoyed his time with it, even if he has some worries for it.
