Epic Games announced a wave of older games that’ll be losing their online services. The change comes as Epic “moves to solely support Epic Online Services with its unified friends system, voice chat features, parental controls, and parental verification features.”
Affected games and accompanying DLC are already being removed from digital stores, along with in-game purchasing functions. Some games will remain playable offline for single and local multiplayer.
Many of the games are developed by Harmonix, which recently announced that its rhythm game Fuser will lose service on December 19.
The earliest game to be shut down will be Battle Breakers on December 30. Come January 24, 2023, games such as the the alpha version of Unreal Tournament, the original three Rock Band games, and the first three Dance Central titles will no longer be playable online.
Note that only the first three titles in the Dance Central and Rock Band franchises are losing service. Dance Central VR and Rock Band 4’s respective online functions will remain available to players.
In addition, the Rock Band companion app and arcade game Rock Band Blitz will also shut down on that same date, as will the developer’s Singspace VR game.
Notably, 2007’s Unreal Tournament 3 is included in the list of games shutting down. But Epic has clarified the title will be revived via Epic Online Services, presumably ahead of its incoming free-to-play version’s release on Steam and other PC platforms in the near future.