Ready at Dawn`s co-founder, Ru Weerasuriya, recently expressed his principal regret regarding the PlayStation 4 exclusive, The Order: 1886: the lack of sufficient development time. In a new interview, he disclosed that the studio had to remove approximately 30% of the game`s content to meet its scheduled release date in February 2015.
Speaking with The Game Business, Weerasuriya discussed the team`s strong desire for a sequel to The Order: 1886 and reflected on the factors contributing to the game`s lukewarm critical reception. He specifically highlighted the “game length” as a prominent point of contention among critics, referencing GameSpot`s reviewer who completed the game in just six hours. Weerasuriya stated, “We cut… I want to say 30% of the game a few months before it was released. We decided it had to come out in the time allotted. Were we to do it again, I would`ve probably tried to figure out a way to extend the development.”
In the week leading up to the game`s launch on February 20, 2015, a leaked playthrough surfaced on YouTube, showing the game being completed in about five hours. This prompted Ready at Dawn to promptly deny the claim, asserting that the game`s actual length was closer to eight to ten hours.
Weerasuriya also commented on the decision not to include multiplayer in The Order: 1886. He revealed, “We did do a multiplayer in the first year of development, but we didn`t have the budget and time to finish it and, together with Sony, we decided to kill it in year two, and hopefully bring it back in a sequel.” He added that the initial multiplayer version was “functioning” and “fun.”
Despite Weerasuriya mentioning that the team had “the story for the second and third one,” a sequel never came to fruition. It`s worth noting that Sony had already delayed The Order: 1886 once before, pushing its release from May 2014 to 2015.
Earlier this year, Andrea Pessino, another co-founder of Ready at Dawn, also touched upon the unreleased sequel. Like Weerasuriya, he attributed the cut content to the immense pressure to ship the game. Ready at Dawn itself was acquired by Facebook in 2020 but was subsequently shut down last year.