Calling All Cars calls it quits as servers are shutdown

David Jaffe has written on his blog that the Calling All Cars online servers went down for good yesterday.

A notice of the impending server closure for the Eat Sleep Play game was posted on PSN back in October, informing folks that they had until January to enjoy play.

"I'd say she had a good run online, but she really didn't," he wrote about the game. "With the exception of the first few hours when the game hit PSN, there were never more than 3-5 people playing at a time. Until tonite, that is, when a handful of loyal CAC supporters came out to say their goodbyes.

"I'm a little sad, naturally, to see the online aspect shut down. This was the first online game I'd ever done and so it was a HUGE learning experience. And it was my first step away from the more story based games I'd been working on and my first step into the arcade, play mechanic experiences our new company is focused on now.

"I loved working on it and many on the team did as well. My biz partner Scott Campbell often says this was the most fun he ever had making a game. I don't know if it was- for me- the MOST fun but it was indeed a damn good time".

Jaffe also wrote that the biggest flaw with the game was its lack of making you want to stick with it, admitting that after playing three "very fun" matches, he was finished and didn't want to play it any more.

"I think we did a really good job making a fantastic piece of bubble gum that was sweet and jam packed with sugar and had a hell of a bang when you put it in your mouth." he said. "But for some reason I still have not totally figured out, the flavor faded VERY fast. You could come back to it after 2-4 weeks and have that same great experience, but it was always a really short ride.

"Some folks say leaderboards and trophy support would have helped. And they would have, for sure. But the core game was lacking something that kept people coming back...I think most likely in our attempt to create a fast, furious, pick up play party game that reminded us of the classic SNES and arcade games we grew up on, we neglected the depth.

"I know you can have both in this kind of game...hard to know if Calling All Cars doesn't have the depth because we were so focused on short term play goals that we simply forgot to put it in or because it never occurred to us to put it in in the first place."

Jaffe went on to critique the title, and wax nostalgic over it at length. If you are a fan of Jaffe, or the just the game in general, it's a decent read.