FACEBOOK
YOUTUBE
TWITTER
With great power comes great responsibility and that is also true to the studios behind some ambitious free-to-play games. However, sometimes the ambition is just too much and some promising games fail before the dust even settles down. Or there was some miscalculation along the way and players didn’t correspond as expected. Whatever the reason, some games didn’t stay long with us.
Here is our Top 10 Free to Play MMO Blunders:
While the FIFA franchise remains active in Asian territories, the Western version of FIFA Online only began Open Beta testing on May 2010. This famous sport named football that US citizens call soccer has a large fan base in Europe and it should be more than enough to support the game. But it wasn’t. On March 2011 FIFA Online was shut down.
Learn more about FIFA Online
Dubbed as a temporary closure with a relaunch scheduled for Q1 2012, Legend of Edda was a solid MMORPG with cute chibi graphics that could clearly appeal to some players. While the developer is supposedly working on an improved version of the game, Soul Master was also expected to return during the summer of 2011 and yet there is no news about it…
Learn more about Legend of Edda
Kitsu Saga launched late 2010 and Aeria Games had high hopes for this fox spirit-driven MMORPG in the same vein as Grand Fantasia or Eden Eternal. It was considered a good free-to-play game and sadly shut down on July 2011. No reasons were appointed and it was all the more odd since Kitsu Saga also apparently enjoyed a good deal of advertising budget. To no avail, it seems.
Learn more about Kitsu Saga
Fists of Fu was a fun side-scroller beat’em up that many players immediately compared to Dragonica Online and Elsword Online, with its colorful graphics and compelling PvP. However, on July 2011, the game was shut down without any real explanation, not even a year after the commercial launch. Some players cherished the decision, others cried.
Learn more about Fists of Fu
Outspark tried to update the Secret of the Solstice MMORPG with Solstice Reborn, with the commercial launch on February 2011. The game was closed on November 16th. The official press release pointed to many reasons for the decision to cancel the game, but they highlight the lack of resources to further develop Solstice Reborn as the main reason. And so, as quickly as Solstice was Reborn, it was shut down.
5-Ruined Online
Ruined Online was a promising third-person action game from Bigpoint and would use the Unity Engine to offer some compelling browser-based 3D visuals. But suddenly, it disappeared. No particular reasons were mentioned, although it’s rumored that the studio wasn’t able to deliver a dynamic and flexible shooter in the Unity Engine and so the results were looking underwhelming. A damn shame, since the cel-shaded visuals were actually looking cool.
Learn more about Ruined Online
Another hyped F2P MMORPG, Faxion Online used the somewhat original theme of the deadly sins and the heaven versus hell conflict to create what was gameplay-wise… apparently a pretty standard MMO game. Faxion shut down only four months after the official launch in May 2011. A case of a good idea let down by resources and time constraints, it seems.
Learn more about Faxion Online
Divine Souls was released during April 2011 and then, on August 30th, 2011, it was “temporarily shut down”. Outspark decided to shut down this third-person brawler, a game that was getting good reviews, to remove some bugs and add some content. Players are still waiting for the return of Divine Souls, which seems more and more unlikely as time goes by. If it does return it will probably be renamed something like Divine Souls X or Mega Divine Souls, offer a new lick of paint and that’s it. It’s a new free-to-play trend, as games such as Archlord X may testify.
2-Poisonville
Bigpoint, the famous German publisher and developer, reportedly spent more than 2 million euros (over 2,600 million dollars) and a workforce of thirty during two years on the development of Poisonville, a free-to-play browser-based 3D action game with clear similarities to Grand Theft Auto and APB: Reloaded. They even hired Bernadette Kaspar, September 2010 playmate, to appear in the game. A series of bugs and age restriction issues culminating in the collapse of Poisonville. However, Bigpoint remains strong with millions of players on Drakensang Online, DarkOrbit or Battlestar Galactica Online.
Learn more about Poisonville
The story of Company of Heroes Online could well be described as ‘I’m in Open Beta, now I’m shutting down’. This disappointed many players who consider Company of Heroes to be one of the best strategy games ever and were expecting a great free-to-play spin-off. It seems that Relic and THQ never found a middle ground between gameplay balance and revenue, since the more someone played, the more in-game currency he earned and the less he had to purchase with real money. And so a promising game ended before it was officially released.
Learn more about Company of Heroes Online
Remember to express your opinion in the comments, if there are other games that deserve to feature here. This top will be regularly updated with the top free to play MMO Blunders, so check back often!
