Though the developers were hoping for “a surprise December or January launch” that would’ve made waves, Frogwares’ The Sinking City 2 has been delayed into 2026.
We have no shortage of Cthulhu-related video games in the works, but after the remaster of the first Sinking City surprise-dropping earlier this year, the horror community has of course kept closer tabs on the sequel, which was announced last year. Now, as the survival horror-oriented game slips into 2026, we remain without a more concrete release window, but Ukrainian studio Frogwares had more than a few good reasons to keep this one in the dark for a while longer.
Sergiy Oganesyan, Head of Publishing, Frogwares, said the following in the latest press release:
“Developing a game during a war isn’t something you can ever really prepare for, but something you need to keep adapting to. At one point, we were losing power for days as drones and missiles hit our power grid. When that tactic stopped working, it became mass drone swarms every other night, going from midnight until dawn. You work all day, then spend the sleepless night listening for explosions, and somehow still need to function the next morning… These things all slowed us down regularly to the point where it just doesn’t make sense to try to rush what we have left to meet a date that we no longer feel is worth chasing. How Moscow’s tactics to terrorize civilians will change again as winter comes is anyone’s guess, so we’d rather be ready to adapt again, knowing we’re able to take our time.”
Oganesyan adds the self-published studio is now targeting the first half of 2026, with the team choosing not to commit to a more specific release window due to the fluid circumstances around the development of the game. Another cited reason behind the delay is the “learning curve” associated with the big jump into proper survival horror (with a bigger emphasis on action) territory. Alexander Gresko, Lead Game Designer, explained the reality of the process:
“Switching to survival horror for the first time has been a whole new kind of challenge for us in itself, too. We’ve been making investigation adventures for more than twenty years, but survival horror asks for a completely different kind of design thinking. Tension, pacing, combat, etc. We’ve always loved the genre as fans, but once you start building it yourself, you realize how much you still have to do. It’s exciting, but it definitely makes development slower.”
The Sinking City 2 is set to release on PC, PS5, and Xbox Series X/S. New screenshots have been shared to make up for the delay, and you can see all of them below:
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