IO Interactive has decided to change how they will be distributing their newest entry of the popular Hitman series. The problem with trying something new is that there is a chance it won’t work properly, which is what happened. It started on the twelfth when David Scammell of Videogamer reported that people who pre-ordered the game digitally via the European PlayStation Store had their pre-orders cancelled.
According to a post made by a PlayStation’s European Support Staff, this was done because the publisher had significantly changed the configuration of the product and had removed pre-orders for the game and cancelled all additional pre-orders for Hitman. The staff member, with the forum name “KingGobbo”, went on to say that those who pre-ordered the game should expect a conformation email about the cancellation.
Gameinformer reached out to Square Enix about the problem and were told,
If your HITMAN pre-order is cancelled, don’t panic, release date is still March 11th. We’re adjusting a few things & will update in a few days. Sorry for any confusion.
At first, Hitman was initially planned to come out with six campaign missions, three different sandbox locations, forty signature kills, contracts mode with 800 targets, and weekly live events and hits. With more content coming out for three months after the initial March 11th release. Players could have chosen to only purchase the $35 “Intro Pack” which comes with all of the initial March content mentioned above, and have the option to upgrade to all future content with the $29.99 “Upgrade Pack”.
Then in IO’s New Year update on the game, they announced it will be entirely episodic.
The price of the “Intro Pack” has been changed to $15 and will include the prologue mission and the Paris setting, with each subsequent episode priced at $10. The next location, Italy is set to be released in April and Morocco in May. No other information has been given about the release dates for the episodes. A single purchase upgrade to the “full experience” will be available for $50 as well as the standard $60 price for the full version of the game. A retail disc version of the game will be released by the end of 2016.
Hitman is still available for digital pre-order on Steam and isn’t available for pre-order digitally on the Xbox One. PS4 players will still have access to the beta, starting February 12th, if they pre-ordered the full version or the intro pack.