Yager just can't catch a break - The Cycle: Frontier to shut down in September
When it shuts down this summer, The Cycle: Frontier will have lasted just a little over one year since launch.
Yager, the developer behind Spec Ops: The Line, as well as several free-to-play online games, is shutting down its latest project - The Cycle: Frontier. Frontier was a spin-off of The Cycle, a beloved game with a modest fanbase that ultimately wasn't financially viable .
The original game was a co-op PvE shooter, but Frontier was among the first to adapt the extraction shooter genre to a science-fiction environment. The PvEvP Frontier had a decent active audience when it launched in June last year, but the hype has died down since. Unfortunately, Frontier is also going to suffer the same fate its predecessor did, and it's also because it simply doesn't make enough money to be sustainable.
Yager broke the news in a Steam post, confirming September 27, 2023 to be the last day servers will be online, just over a year after launch.
"Despite our best efforts and meaningful improvements brought to the game since launch and up until the release of Season 3, the reality is that The Cycle: Frontier is unfortunately not financially viable," wrote the developer.
"This is a very hard decision for us, but after debating it for a long while, we had to accept this is the best course of action for Yager."
In the blog post, the developer recapped the game's journey, from pre-launch tests to the anticipated launch, which exceeded the studio's expectations and forced it to upgrade its backend to support the influx of new players.
Unfortunately, that success also attracted a lot of cheaters, which proved to be a major problem for the developer and players. Despite working as quickly as possible to improve Frontier's anti-cheat tech, including bringing in additional partners, it was simply too late.
All that time spent took away from the development of improvements and new content, which didn't help retain players. Following the launch of Season 2, the developer retreated to reassess the game's present state vs the original vision, and made some crucial changes that seemed to attract lapsed and new players - but that, too, wasn't enough.
Yager is suspending real-money purchases, and taking down currency bundles from the store. Rotating in-game items will be available at 95%+ discounts, and the premium version of the Season 3 battle pass will be given to all players who log in for free. Anyone who made a real-money purchases after June 14 will receive a full refund.
The Cycle: Frontier is just the latest in a long line of online/live service games that recently shut down. Babylon’s Fall, CrossfireX, Knockout City, Deathverse: Let It Die, Final Fantasy 7: The First Soldier, Rumbleverse, Apex Legends Mobile, Super People 2 are all either already offline, or will be before the end of 2023