Things are looking good for Psychonauts 2. In their latest developer update, Double Fine's Tim Schaefer revealed that this would be the last month that the game would receive any new content, and the remaining months before release would be all about polishing and bug squashing. You can play Psychonauts 2 from beginning to end, and although it's still got some work before Double Fine is willing to release it, the game is basically done.
On top of that, Shaefer revealed that Psychonauts 2 is a rarity in the games industry--a game that was made completely without crunch.
In the dev video, Schaefer recounts how the first Psychonauts game involved a crunch before release that "was one of the worst ones we'd ever done." Although the historical footage makes 12-hour days, 6-7 day weeks sound like a quaint throwback to a bygone era, crunch is still very much a part of the games industry even as developers themselves rail against it.
Schaefer does note that it's tempting to force a crunch period on his team, noting that at this point in Psychonauts 2's development, "[You] can't move the money, can't move the scheduling, can't move the quality--all you can do is move the quality of everyone's life down."
That said, Schaefer vowed early in Psychonauts 2's development that Double Fine would not resort to crunch in order to complete the game, and he's sticking to his promise.
However, that does mean a few features that were on internal drawing boards will have to be cut before the final product is released later in 2021. One feature mentioned in the video was a tram ride section that wasn’t quite ready to be fully implemented, with other members of the dev team suggesting it be replaced by a simpler slide.
From the sound of things, it looks like we could see Psychonauts 2 sooner rather than later in 2021.
Source: Double Fine Productions