BioShock Infinite Delay for Multiplayer

Though the enthusiasm for BioShock Infinite that was steamrolling towards October might have been tempered a little bit after it was today announced the game has been delayed until February, the assumption is that the delay will serve a purpose. In an open letter to fans Ken Levine explained the motivations behind the BioShock Infinite delay and promised a quality product early next year.

While Levine makes no mention of it in his letter, rumors are starting to swirl that hypothesize this delay might allow developer Irrational Games some time to add multiplayer to the game. Multiplayer, up until this point, hasn't even seemed like a possibility for BioShock Infinite, but a job posting on LinkedIn suggests it could be happening.

The job posting in question, which was found by our colleagues at Shacknews, claims it is searching for a "network engineer" who would be responsible for "delivering a robust, scalable, and responsive client-side networking support on the PC, PS3, and Xbox 360 platforms." It doesn't specifically explain that Irrational is looking for someone to design a multiplayer experience, but if that were already in the pipeline perhaps this network engineer would help with the server side of the equation.

It's not an outright given that BioShock Infinite would feature multiplayer, but 2K Marin's BioShock 2 did show that the franchise could work in that space. Considering Irrational has been keen on keeping things regarding Infinite pretty quiet one has to figure that multiplayer — a mode that shouldn't require a ton of story secrets — would have been revealed by now. Instead this delay is more likely just a chance to add a little polish, or maybe a chance to get that Move support figured out.

Either way it's a testament to how highly anticipated BioShock Infinite was that fans are so disappointed by this delay. Hopefully Irrational Games can take this extra development time and deliver something that will blow our minds.

Would you like to see a multiplayer mode in BioShock Infinite? How would you feel if the delay was only meant to fine-tune a multiplayer mode?

BioShock Infinite releases February 26, 2013 for the PS3, Xbox 360, and PC.

Source: LinkedIn (via Shacknews)