Yet Another Live-Service Game Is Shutting Down Just Months After Launch
Nexon's Warhaven is shutting down this spring, after what will be seven months of early access on Steam and before its planned console launch.
In an announcement on Steam, the development team at Nexon said it was with a "heavy heart" that it would soon be shutting down the sword-based multiplayer title's live service operations.
"To create a game that could be cherished and enjoyed over an extended period, we invested much consideration and effort," Nexon's statement reads. "However, regrettably, we must bid our sincere farewell as of April 5, 2024. We apologize that we could not come to you with better news."
Warhaven saw teams of players battling against each other with various weapon-based classes, with the ability to transform into one of four powerful Immortal characters once per match to turn the tide of battle. It launched into Steam early access on September 20, 2023, with Nexon planning to implement feedback over the course of development and for the game to leave early access sometime in early 2024. Since launch, Warhaven received regular event updates, balance patches, and two new classes, the Bard and Claw.
It was only in December that the game's director, Eunseok Yi, in a post on Steam said that 2024 would bring "great changes" to Warhaven and that the team looked forward to celebrating "200 and 300 days together" since its early access launch.
Unfortunately, it seems Warhaven never quite found an audience. The game currently sports a "Mixed" average user review score on Steam, and following an all-time player peak of more than 10,000 players shortly after launch, has struggled to surpass more than 300 players in the last month, according to SteamDB.
It was announced around the time of the game's Steam launch that Warhaven would come to PlayStation 5 and Xbox Series X S in 2024. However, it never received a specific release date and no additional news about the console versions had been shared prior to the shutdown announcement.
Warhaven is far from the only free-to-play live-service game to shut down in recent months. Bandai Namco's Overwatch-inspired shooter Gundam Evolution lasted a year before going offline in November 2023. Last year, Iron Galaxy's free-to-play wrestler royale Rumbleverse shut down after just six months of service. Meanwhile, in the mobile game space, a new rhythm game announced its launch date, and server closure date, at the same time.
