Epic Games announced today they're killing off a bunch of classic games removing them from stores and turning off their online services for retro delights like Unreal Tournament.
Why are they doing this? They're consolidating their services directly into their modern all-in-one Epic Online Services, so they don't want anything not using that to stick around that they have to maintain.
Here's the full list of titles being removed from stores (some are already gone like Unreal Tournament), and having their online play turned off on January 24 - 2023:
- 1000 Tiny Claws
- Dance Central 1-3
- Note: Dance Central VR online multiplayer will remain available
- Green Day: Rock Band
- Monsters (Probably) Stole My Princess
- Rock Band 1-3
- Note: Rock Band 4 online multiplayer will remain available
- The Beatles: Rock Band
- Supersonic Acrobatic Rocket-Powered Battle-Cars
- Unreal Gold
- Unreal II: The Awakening
- Unreal Tournament 2003
- Unreal Tournament 2004
- Unreal Tournament 3
- Note: We have plans to bring back online features via Epic Online Services in the future.
- Unreal Tournament: Game of the Year Edition
Hopefully the community (like perhaps OldUnreal), will find a way to get online going again for some of the classic Unreal Tournament games. Otherwise, that's a whole lot of FPS history being lost.
For Unreal Tournament 3, it looks like they're re-branding it as Unreal Tournament 3 X and making it free to play, as you can see they already did it on the Steam page and you can see all the changes on SteamDB history but it's not actually live they're just re-purposing the Steam page.
On top of that they also said they're removing Linux and macOS versions of Hatoful Boyfriend and Hatoful Boyfriend: Holiday Star today. No reason given for either.
If you do want to stock up, the old Unreal games are still on GOG but probably won't be for long.
Article taken from GamingOnLinux.com.
Quoting: KoopacabrasI wonder how much maintaining these servers costs? there are places where you can rent a multiplayer server for 10-15 bucks. Either Epic is really desperate cutting costs or dunnoh because it doesn't adds up.They don't even host the game servers themselves, just the master server which does nothing but validate the "cd key" and provide a list of ip addresses and names for the servers. (when you bring a server online it connects to the master to add to the list), you could literally host the service on a RPi3 in someone's closet, and it wouldn't even break a sweat. Them taking it online doesn't kill the ability to play, it just kills the ability to find servers through the ingame server browser, and the ability to ban by account (instead of IP).
otoh Epic Online services is so great that it doesn't work with their inhouse games, It's like Left for dead or Portal not working with Steam imao.
The game servers themselves especially for 99/2k4 I was running back until 2010ish, I ran a few and my average cost back then was around ~$2-3/month per server.
It's clearly not a cost savings thing though, half the games on that list are single player.
ElectricPrism Dec 14, 2022
... that didn't age well i guess
Quoting: Benom"Notice: Notice: Unreal Tournament 3 X is no longer available on the Steam store."It's because they're updating an old page for the new edition.
... that didn't age well i guess
slaapliedje Dec 14, 2022
So screw you Sweeney!
As for the master server, as with many late 90s multiplayer FPS, players have been using their own server lists for a long time now.
I just hope that some day, a (yet to be known) dev is going to release titles as groundbreaking as Quake 3 or UT, so that we can live another golden age of the arena shooters...
Mountain Man Dec 14, 2022
Ah, the good ol' days.
pleasereadthemanual Dec 15, 2022
Very strange.
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