Not too long ago, it felt like there was no escape from live-service games. Bethesda’s unveiling of Fallout 76 in 2018 felt like an ominous bellwether – was every iconic franchise now fated to transform into a forever game? Was ever-evolving multiplayer with seasonal content updates the way forward for our favourite RPGs and shooters?
Fast forward eight years and the landscape is looking very different. Major gaming publishers are cancelling live-service games left, right and centre, while many newcomers arrive on the scene only to pack up their bags and disappear within a few short months.
Some will, understandably, celebrate the apparent downturn of the live-service model. Others, meanwhile, will see this as cause for concern. The battle pass era has been a veritable financial feast for the video games industry’s revenue growth – if it disappears, does that profitable growth disappear along with it? For some, the problem is not the disappearance of “forever games”, but the reasons why the sector is contracting. And another group will even challenge the assertion that live-service is even disappearing at all.
Above all else, one thing is clear: there’s change on the horizon.
The Past, Present, and Future of Live-Service Live-service is one of the biggest issues in gaming. Is it a curse destined to destroy studios, or the key to the industry's survival? With expert insight from veteran developers, including Overwatch's Jeff Kaplan and Anthem's Mark Darrah, IGN exlores the long timeline of live-service games across three detailed articles. Combining interviews, analysis, and opinion, this is the past, present, and future of gaming's most divisive trend.
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