Shaq Fu sequel finally coming out this spring

It’s taken nearly four years, but the sequel to (notoriously terrible) 16-bit fighting game Shaq Fu is finally on the verge of release. The developers behind Shaq Fu: A Legend Reborn announced today that the game, crowdfunded on Indiegogo in 2014, will be released sometime this spring.

Shaq Fu: A Legend Reborn is coming to Nintendo Switch, PlayStation 4, Windows PC and Xbox One, according to developer Saber Interactive and publisher Wired Productions. At one point, the new Shaq Fu was also coming to PlayStation 3, Wii U and Xbox 360, but plans have changed.

Communication about the fate of Shaq Fu: A Legend Reborn has been sparse over the past year. Prior to today, the most recent update posted to Indiegogo was from December 2016, when the producers said the game was “very close to completion.”

“We had a few changes to implement and have been quality testing and getting all the ratings certificates but we’re 99% there,” the producers said.

“we wrangled with unforeseen difficulties in getting the game released”

In an update posted to Indiegogo, the company behind the game, Big Deez Productions, said it has been on a “long, difficult road over the last year or so as we wrangled with unforeseen difficulties in getting the game released.”

“You wouldn’t believe some of the problems we’ve encountered,” Big Deez Productions said. “We wrote the game over three years ago and had not [sic] idea what history had in store for the world at that time. As a result, we had to change certain narratives because things got a little Nostradamus as the months unfolded. Some major plot changes meant we had to rework certain sections of the game that had a huge impact on the story overall.”

According to one report, the developers behind Shaq Fu: A Legend Reborn encountered unspecified licensing issues. In addition to Shaquille O’Neal’s likeness, the new Shaq Fu promised “outlandish celebrity bosses” and, in one trailer, included ads for Icy Hot, a pain reliever that Shaq endorses, but it’s unclear if these inclusions had an impact on development.

Saber and Wired also confirmed that anyone who purchased the Switch version of NBA Playgrounds — Saber’s previous game — prior to June 10, 2017, will receive a free copy of Shaq Fu when it is released. Due to major delays with a promised update to add online play to NBA Playgrounds on Switch, Saber announced in early June that it would offer the freebie as a make-good to frustrated customers.