The recent spread of the 2019 novel coronavirus (2019-nCoV) across the globe in the past 2 months has no doubt negatively impacted society as a whole. First originating in the city of Wuhan, China, the coronavirus has since quickly spread like wildfire throughout Southeast Asia, East Asia and the rest of the world soon after.
While doctors, scientists, and medical staff are no doubt scrambling to get the latest epidemic contained, Geek Culture understands that even the world of geekdom wasn’t spared from the affliction of the coronavirus.
These companies that produce toys, games and tech have either postponed pre-orders for new products, pulled out of major conventions or events, or have had their physical stores (especially those in and around China) closed to prevent the spread of the virus. The various delays and shortages will no doubt disappoint many geeks, but given the circumstances, it was, as Thanos would say, inevitable.
Without further ado, here’s the list of toy, game, and tech companies all affected by the coronavirus:
Toys
- Mattel (China factory store closed down)
- Prime 1 Studio (shipments delayed)
- First 4 Figures (shipments delayed)
- Good Smile Company (shipments delayed)
Games
- Nintendo (shipments for the Switch and its limited-edition variants will all be delayed throughout 2020)
- Oculus Quest (shipments delayed)
Tech
- Samsung (limited participation in MWC Barcelona 2020, physical stores in China closed down)
- LG (pulled out of MWC Barcelona 2020)
- Sony (pulled out of MWC Barcelona 2020)
- ASUS (shortage on ASUS ROG Phone II)
- Xiaomi (physical stores in China closed down)
- Nvidia (pulled out of MWC Barcelona 2020)
- Amazon (pulled out of MWC Barcelona 2020)
And the list just keeps on growing. Hopefully, the coronavirus won’t worsen too much to the point that all our geeky needs are completely halted. In the wake of such troubling times, it certainly wouldn’t hurt to have something to look forward to in the form of a new figure to populate your desk or piece of tech to play around with while waiting for the epidemic to subside.
Marion has a serious RPG addiction. Sometimes it bleeds into real life; he forgets to sleep because he thinks he has a Witcher’s body clock. Forgive him in advance if he suddenly blurts out terms such as “Mind Flayer” and “Magic Missile”, because never once does he stop thinking about his next Dungeons & Dragons game.
Trinity Sun
Si Jia
