Running out of GAAS
If you’re keeping score on games going offline, you can add another tally mark. Smilegate Entertainment has announced that military shooter CrossfireX will be shutting down on May 18, 2023. This adds to a growing list of games-as-a-service titles that are being given the axe.
What makes CrossfireX a bit unique in this regard, however, is that it has a single-player component developed by Remedy Entertainment. And despite that this is something that should not require an internet connection, once the servers go quiet, the campaign will be inaccessible, according to an FAQ from the developers. Note that the single-player wasn’t free, but apparently, the price paid wasn’t enough to ensure any effort would be made to divest it from the servers.
Whenever a game is announced as “always online,” there tends to be a bit of nose-gazing where it’s suggested that it’s perfectly okay in the modern age of fridges connected to the internet. Well, where’s your God now? Maybe CrossfireX wasn’t the most whiz-bang revolutionary game, but this sort of thing could happen to any game that requires an internet connection for whatever reason. This includes some internet-dependent DRM solutions like Denuvo.
To add more poop to the pot, while CrossfireX is free-to-play in regards to multiplayer, it was supported by in-app purchases. Smilegate will refund all of these purchases… so long as they were made fourteen days prior to this announcement. I guess there needs to be a cutoff date, since even ephemeral experiences have a price tag, but considering this announcement comes less than a year after the CrossfireX’s release, it might be hard to swallow for some.
So, that’s your four-minute warning. Crossfire X is currently available on Xbox One and Xbox Series X|S, but it won’t be after May 18.
