Konami has announced its intention to "end service" of its detective PvP game Crimesight (opens in new tab) less than a year after its April 2022 launch. The publisher attributed this to "various circumstances" and said that Crimesight will go offline on May 1, 2023 at 00:00 PM PDT, with bundle sales ending already on February 27, when the game will be discontinued.

To be clear, this effectively means the game will cease to exist, as it is an online experience with no single-player mode. Konami stated (open in new tab) that online competition will no longer be available after the service ends, and that the game itself will no longer be playable.

This news comes after CrimeSite failed to reach a sufficient number of players to sustain an online game that requires multiple players, despite mostly positive reviews from players: the highest number of players ever was 572 seven months ago ( open in new tab), with four people playing as of this writing.

The problem is that this is not a free-to-play experience: Crimesight launched for $20 and was reduced to $10 last November in order to increase the number of players. So these players are a bit underwhelmed that the game will stop working in a few months, have played less than two hours, and have no obvious recourse unless they ask for a Steam refund: Konami has not mentioned anything about this.

The direct result of this is that the one bright spot of the game, the positive user reviews, have now been replaced by negative reviews, especially regarding the closure, many of which mention having paid for the game. Sadly, many of them even admit to being upset because they liked it. Xograph writes (opens in new tab). 'With no advertising, no communication with developers, and very few updates, it was over in a flash.'

How long companies should support online games is like asking the length of a piece of string. Some games just fade away, while others are driven by the collapse of the company behind them or by simple economic reasons (as in this case) of not having enough players, and the decision is made by the accountant. But when a product sold at an upfront price ends after a year, and from a publisher of this size, it feels different: maybe Konami didn't give enough in return to the players who put their money down.