Developer Red 5 Studios announced yesterday that it will suspend work on the free-to-play sci-fi MMO “Firefall,” effective today, July 7. The studio announced the unfortunate news on its official website but refused to detail the reason behind the closure.
News of the game officially shutting down is kind of a big deal, given “Firefall” is actually Red 5’s first and seemingly only project to date. The announcement of the game’s closure had been abrupt, leaving some fans crestfallen, but the studio made up for it by announcing a mobile version of the game.
Red 5 says it’s currently being developed.
“With heavy hearts, we regret to inform you that after much review and analysis, Red 5 Studios have decided to suspend the Firefall efforts on 7th, July 2017,” the dev team wrote. “Thank you for being an important part of the experience and for your loyalty and dedication to the online community.”
The tumultuous ‘Firefall’ development
Anyone who’s been playing the game knows that it had been rocky from the very start, ever since it was announced back in 2010. When it launched, it looked quite promising, and gamers loved piloting the game’s Battleframes through tropical backdrops.
It’s no secret that a huge amount of cash was shelled out to market before the beta launch, but somewhere along the lines, it lost its way.
The MMO had undergone major changes as well, and in 2013, Red 5’s CEO Mark Kern got sacked. Kern co-founded Red 5 in 2006 after spending more than seven years at Blizzard Entertainment working on games such as “StarCraft,” “StarCraft 64” and “World of Warcraft.”
By the end of 2015, the company had undergone significant layoffs and later proved unable to pay its staffers on Christmas Day.
In August 2016, players really thought it was the end of it all, as “Firefall” servers mysteriously went offline. Gaming websites and forums were quick to assume that the devs had quietly shut the game down, but it went back up, with Red 5 issuing an apology, saying it was all a technical glitch.
‘Firefall’ the mobile game
As news of the game’s closure is fairly new, Red 5 hasn’t dropped details concerning the mobile version of the game yet.
It did, however, promise to update fans soon and that those who will continue to play the game on their devices will be “rewarded greatly.”
Released in 2014, “Firefall” is a free-to-play MMO shooter set in a dynamic, living, open world. Players can combat enemies in a skill based shooter in either first or third person view or engage dynamic Missions and Events, including epic Titan Battles.
