Yacht Club Games announced just weeks before launch that Mina the Hollower, its highly anticipated follow-up to Shovel Knight, won’t make its Halloween 2025 release date. The studio revealed the delay in a blog post humorously titled Delay Extravaganza II: The Tail Continues, explaining that despite working tirelessly day and night to finish development for the October 31 deadline, the team simply isn’t quite there yet. However, Yacht Club emphasized this isn’t a major delay but rather a stretch of time to apply final polish and balancing to make the game truly shine.
What’s Taking Extra Time
Yacht Club Games provided transparency about exactly what work remains before Mina the Hollower reaches players. The team is currently finalizing design, art, and sound elements that need those last touches before submission. Overall game balancing represents another priority, ensuring combat encounters, puzzle difficulty, and progression feel properly tuned throughout the adventure. Implementing localization for multiple languages also requires testing to ensure translations maintain the game’s tone and clarity across different regions.
The studio also mentioned eating cheese among their tasks, maintaining the lighthearted tone that Shovel Knight fans expect from Yacht Club. More seriously, testing across all platforms consumes significant resources as the team plays through the complete game daily, hunting for bugs and issues that could slip through to launch. The developers want to avoid the common indie problem of releasing too early and spending months patching rather than celebrating a successful launch.
No New Date Until Platform Submission
Unlike many delay announcements that immediately provide a new target date, Yacht Club Games specifically stated they won’t announce another release window until Mina the Hollower has been submitted to platforms for review. This cautious approach prevents the studio from promising dates they might miss again, which would damage credibility and disappoint fans twice. Platform submission begins the certification process where Sony, Microsoft, Nintendo, and Valve verify games meet technical requirements and quality standards.
The fact that Yacht Club won’t commit to a date until reaching that milestone suggests they’ve learned from past experiences about the unpredictability of final development stages. Small issues discovered late can balloon into weeks of additional work, making firm commitments risky. By waiting for submission, the studio ensures any announced date accounts for actual remaining work rather than optimistic estimates that might prove unrealistic.
How Long Will the Delay Last
Based on Yacht Club’s language describing this as not a major delay and their statement that the game is so close to being done, industry observers expect Mina the Hollower to release within a few months rather than being pushed deep into 2026. Bloomberg’s Jason Schreier, a well-respected gaming journalist, suggested the delay shouldn’t be more than a few months in his newsletter covering the announcement.
The studio’s claim that they’re playing the game from start to finish every day indicates development has reached the polish phase rather than still building core content. Games at this stage typically need weeks or months rather than additional years. A late 2025 release before the holidays remains plausible, though early 2026 seems more likely given the time needed for final testing, localization implementation, and platform certification processes.
Escaping an Overcrowded Release Window
| Major October 2025 Releases | Platform | Genre |
|---|---|---|
| Battlefield 6 | Multi-platform | First-person shooter |
| Call of Duty | Multi-platform | First-person shooter |
| Dragon Age: The Veilguard | Multi-platform | Action RPG |
| Mario & Luigi: Brothership | Nintendo Switch | RPG |
| Sonic X Shadow Generations | Multi-platform | Platformer |
While Yacht Club insists final polish drove the delay decision, escaping October’s incredibly stacked release schedule certainly doesn’t hurt. October 2025 featured massive franchise releases including Battlefield 6, the latest Call of Duty, Dragon Age: The Veilguard, and multiple other high-profile titles competing for attention and dollars. Even exceptional indie games struggle to break through when launching alongside blockbuster franchises with massive marketing budgets.
Mina the Hollower’s Ambitious Scope
Mina the Hollower represents Yacht Club Games’ first completely original IP since Shovel Knight broke out in 2014, making the stakes higher than typical indie projects. The game draws inspiration from classic top-down Zelda titles like Link’s Awakening and Oracle of Ages/Seasons, combined with Castlevania’s darker aesthetic. Players control Mina, a mouse inventor and member of the Hollower guild, as she explores Tenebrous Isle to discover why her Spark Generators have mysteriously failed.
The gameplay revolves around Mina’s signature ability to burrow underground, creating strategic opportunities in both combat and exploration. She wields the Nightstar whip that attacks in four directions, complemented by sidearms like hatchets and daggers for ranged combat. Trinkets provide permanent ability boosts, while the game’s interconnected world encourages exploration and sequence-breaking similar to classic Metroidvania design. According to developers, Mina the Hollower is the largest game Yacht Club has created to date, explaining why final polish requires extra time.
The Kickstarter Success Story
Mina the Hollower originated as a Kickstarter campaign that raised substantial funds from eager backers who trusted Yacht Club based on Shovel Knight’s quality and the studio’s post-launch support reputation. Crowdfunding creates unique pressure since backers funded development years in advance and deserve the polished product they supported. Yacht Club’s transparency about the delay and commitment to quality over arbitrary deadlines demonstrates respect for that relationship.
The studio has maintained consistent communication with backers throughout development, providing regular updates and even releasing a free demo that carries save data forward to the full release. This approach builds goodwill that softens disappointment when delays inevitably occur. Most backers seem understanding based on community reactions, recognizing they’d rather wait slightly longer for a finished game than receive a rushed product that requires months of patches.
Yacht Club’s Track Record
Yacht Club Games earned its reputation through Shovel Knight, which launched in 2014 to critical acclaim and commercial success as one of the definitive examples of modern retro-inspired game design. The studio continued supporting Shovel Knight for years with substantial free DLC campaigns including Plague of Shadows, Specter of Torment, and King of Cards that each offered completely new characters, movesets, and storylines.
Beyond DLC, Yacht Club published spin-offs like Shovel Knight Showdown, a fighting game, and Shovel Knight: Pocket Dungeon, a puzzle-action hybrid. This sustained commitment to quality and post-launch support created trust that Yacht Club won’t abandon projects or release subpar products. That reputation makes fans more willing to accept delays, understanding the studio prioritizes delivering excellent experiences over hitting arbitrary release windows.
Switch 2 Implications
Mina the Hollower is confirmed for Nintendo Switch 2, which Nintendo has acknowledged but not officially revealed or dated. The delay potentially positions the game closer to Switch 2’s presumed 2026 launch window, allowing Yacht Club to optimize the experience for Nintendo’s new hardware. While the game will release on current Switch alongside other platforms, having extra development time to ensure the Switch 2 version runs excellently could benefit the game’s long-term sales.
Retro-inspired pixel art games like Mina the Hollower typically run well on any modern hardware, but proper optimization ensures loading times, frame rates, and battery life reach their potential. Launching alongside or shortly after Switch 2’s release would also give the game visibility during the new console’s launch window when players actively seek titles to showcase their new hardware.
Frequently Asked Questions
When will Mina the Hollower actually release now?
Yacht Club Games hasn’t announced a new release date and stated they won’t until the game is submitted to platforms for certification. Based on their description of this as not a major delay and the game being so close to completion, industry observers expect a release within a few months, likely late 2025 or early 2026.
What is Mina the Hollower about?
Mina the Hollower is a top-down action-adventure game inspired by classic Zelda titles and Castlevania. Players control Mina, a mouse inventor who can burrow underground, as she explores Tenebrous Isle using her whip and various sidearms to combat enemies and solve puzzles in an interconnected world.
Why was the game delayed?
According to Yacht Club Games, the team needs extra time to finalize design, art, and sound elements, balance gameplay throughout the entire adventure, implement localization for multiple languages, and conduct thorough testing across all platforms to ensure a polished launch rather than rushing to meet the Halloween deadline.
Is this Yacht Club Games’ first game since Shovel Knight?
While Yacht Club published spin-offs like Shovel Knight Showdown and Pocket Dungeon, Mina the Hollower is their first completely original IP since Shovel Knight launched in 2014. It’s also reportedly the largest game the studio has developed to date in terms of scope and content.
Will the game still come to all announced platforms?
Yes, Mina the Hollower remains planned for Nintendo Switch, Nintendo Switch 2, PlayStation 4, PlayStation 5, Xbox One, Xbox Series X/S, and PC when it releases. The delay affects all platforms equally.
Can I still play the demo?
Yes, the free demo remains available and save data carries forward to the full release. The demo lets players experience early gameplay and decide if they want to purchase the complete game when it launches.
Did crowdfunding backers get their money back?
No, backers who funded the Kickstarter campaign still receive the game when it releases. Delays are common in game development and backers generally understand that quality takes precedence over hitting original estimated delivery dates. Yacht Club has maintained consistent communication throughout development.
Quality Over Deadlines
Yacht Club Games’ decision to delay Mina the Hollower exemplifies the difficult choices indie developers face between meeting promised dates and ensuring product quality. The studio built its reputation on delivering polished experiences that respect players’ time and money, making a short delay the right call despite disappointment. With the game playing from start to finish daily and only needing final touches rather than major overhauls, Mina the Hollower should reach players soon in the best possible state. The extra weeks or months spent balancing encounters, implementing localization, and squashing bugs will be forgotten once players experience the complete adventure Yacht Club envisioned. October 2025’s overcrowded release schedule would have buried even an excellent indie game, so the delay might prove beneficial both for quality assurance and market positioning when Mina finally burrows onto players’ screens.