Wargaming’s Steel Hunters to close its servers in October. Another live-service game heads to the scrapyard

This was meant to be Wargaming’s next big hit, but now it’s just joining the list of multiplayer games that didn’t quite hit the money goals. Steel Hunters’ servers are shutting down in just a few months. The mech shooter, revealed in December 2024 and launched this April, won’t even make it through its first year.

Steel Hunters’ short flight before the crash landing

Launching a new IP is always a gamble, and even if the concept sounds good, pulling it off is a whole different story. Steel Hunters, a free-to-play shooter from the creators of World of Tanks, launched in Early Access at the start of April 2025. But pretty quickly, reviews started filling up with complaints.

Related:Steel Hunters is new shooter from World of Tanks creators. This time we will fight with giant robots

The game just felt unfinished even for an EA game, with bad matchmaking, no clear roadmap for what’s next, and, as usual, complaints about the microtransaction system. The player base shrank fast, and now Wargaming has announced they’re shutting down Steel Hunters’ servers on October 8th.

Source: Steel Hunters; Developer: Wargaming

Before the Sunset, the developers plan to give players a proper send-off. They’ll add the option to create custom games, unlock all the Hunters, including those that haven’t been released yet, and organize one last farewell tournament.

Steel Hunters wasn’t a total disaster. Players saw some potential in the project, and a lot of the negative reviews were aimed more at the publisher’s business practices than the game itself. It definitely won’t go down as 2025’s biggest flop like last year’s Concord, but it does serve as another reminder that live-service titles aren’t always the answer for game development.

Steel Hunters

April 2, 2025

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• Overview

• multiplayer
• Wargaming.net
• shutdown of servers