The popular multiplayer game exclusive to VR headsets Meta is inexplicably marking its swan song and will soon shut down its servers.
In a blog post, Ready at Dawn, the studio behind the title, explains that it has ” many good reasons to make this choice… without them really justifying it.
An echo of the past
Released in 2018, Echo VR (formerly echo arena) was positioned as a flagship game at the launch of the Oculus Quest and Rift S headsets. It was indeed one of the first multiplayer VR games, with a rather original concept and particularly well transcribed into virtual reality. The goal was indeed to evolve in a zero-G arena and to use everything that came to hand (including other players) to drop a frisbee in the opposing goal.
Ready at Dawn was, following the great success of the game, acquired by Meta in 2020, to make it a privileged development studio. This one had also split from an adaptation ofEcho VR in a more classic FPS format, called Echo Combatwhich also enjoyed some popularity.
But all that was before, since the servers of the two games will close their doors on the 1er August to come.
Of the ” good reasons » questionable
Ready at Dawn has thus split a blog article wanting to be ” open and communicative to come back to the situation. ” This was by no means a decision taken lightly. But it was for several good reasons, the main one being that the studio is coming together to focus on our next project. “, we read.
It would have been possible, however, without necessarily having to inject regular updates, to at least keep the servers running to let fans enjoy their game. Reading between the lines, it could therefore be that the population on Echo VR and Echo Combat has decreased too much (on VR games by definition already niche), to the point that maintaining servers is no longer relevant.
To return the frisbee to the zero-G wound, Meta will not compensate for the removal of these two games with refunds for their purchase, that of in-game currency or additional content. A double penalty for two good multiplayer VR games, but which have obviously had their day.
In a few days (October 13), the Oculus Quest 2 will be available at all good retailers in France and Navarre. We were lucky enough to be able to try it out for a long time and long before it was officially released. We now have to answer the “agonizing question”, does this new version of the augmented reality headset bring real improvements compared to the first Quest, launched a little over a year ago.
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Source : Medium
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