The MMORPG Crowfall is currently puzzling everyone: The game has actually catastrophically failed, the founders are gone, the servers are offline, customers regret the loss of their money – but somehow there is also hope.
What is so special about Crowfall right now?
- The servers of Crowfall shut down on November 22. The MMORPG can no longer be played.
- The current developers, however, say: They are continuing to work on Crowfall, want to thoroughly revise the game and release it anew.
This is a very unusual situation: Normally, one does not “de-release” a game. Amazon attempted this with the shooter Crucible in July 2020 and “unpublished” the game, but soon gave up and shut it down.
“EVE Online meets Game of Thrones” – MMORPG raises $1.7 million in crowdfunding
How did it go with Crowfall until the release? The indie MMORPG Crowfall raised a total of $1.76 million in crowdfunding in 2015. It was the project of MMORPG veterans J. Todd Coleman and Gordon Walton: They promised “Game of Thrones meets EVE Online.”
The game was developed for 6 years, most of the time behind closed doors: There was never a real hype around the MMORPG. Crowfall was only a topic for a small number of “backers” who paid money to support the project and play it early.
From the developers, mostly good news came: It was said that there were no money problems because the engine was licensed. Everything was going according to plan, they wanted to make a particularly good release because they only have one “chance” for it. Therefore, they took extra time.
MMORPG launches in July, is already pretty dead by September
How was it at the release? Crowfall was released in July 2021, at the worst possible time: Because at that time there was a lot going on in MMORPG gaming: With the upcoming releases of New World and Lost Ark, the two biggest MMORPG highlights of the last 5 years were on the verge of being launched.
Crowfall did not manage to break through with their release in July 2021 at all: The launch hardly interested anyone and afterwards, as New World entered beta and later released, it got worse and worse.
Developer J. Todd Coleman said:
As you know, Crowfall was released in July. The launch numbers looked great. The August numbers were … good. Not great, not bad – sufficient to keep the game going. But the numbers got worse. In September they had fallen dramatically. Big competitors, a lack of advertising money, much market fatigue […]
New studio buys Crowfall because the boss is a fan of the game – faces leave the MMORPG
What is the situation now? The current state of Crowfall looks bleak:
- The two fathers of the project, Coleman and Walton, have already left Crowfall.
- The game itself was sold in December 2021 to the studio “Monumental”: The head of the company was apparently a fan of Crowfall and believed in the success of the game.
- However, making a success out of Crowfall proves to be even harder for Monumental than expected.
Why does the game seem dead now? Monumental shut down the servers on November 22, 2022, and will redevelop the game from scratch.
They say it is too much work to maintain the live operation of the game. The technology also needs to be improved.
Why is Crowfall officially not dead yet? Monumental says they want to revise and bring back the game, but have not given a specific date for that. They apparently are not in a hurry. The boss says:
I do not know how long it will take, but I want the team to rethink every part of the game. Nothing is taboo. I am pushing for dramatic improvements, and I hope in the end it will be a completely different game.
For many players, Crowfall is dead
What is the mood in the community now? Many have already given up hope. The shutdown of the servers is seen as the end by many.
On November 26, one of those “death of a game” videos appeared, and in forums, people discuss “what went wrong.”
And people also regret having put so much money into a game that now yields nothing. One user writes:
So essentially they are taking down the game that can come back, or not, and former backers and their content are simply disappearing. RIP $2,200.”
The new boss, in any case, says: He loves Crowfall, they have great developers and a game with “strong bones” – they will invest in the team and not rush the MMO. It will take time.
It looks like our MMORPG expert Alexander Leitsch is right with another forecast:
