Velan Studios has revealed that they have decided to shut down Knockout City later this year. Servers will shut down by June 6, 2023 at 12 noon UTC.
Velan will still support the game until then, which does mean that the 9.0 patch is still going live on all platforms this February 28, 2023. This update will also remove all monetization, which means that the TMNT DLC, Deluxe upgrade, and Holobux can no longer be bought with real money.
Holobux can be earned in game, so Velan will make it easier for players to earn it, and also make everything cheaper in game. Players can still keep going and earn all the content they still have planned in the future, which includes events, playlists, brawl pass, etc. Season 9 ends on May 23rd, and they will also hold a special two week farewell event called “Thanks for the KOs.”
There will also be a Private Hosted Server version of the game, which will be available as a free standalone download. Because Knockout City is a multiplayer online game, this game still won’t work as a single player game. Rather, you’ll want to get friends to play with you, with one of you hosting a local game.
And now the big question. Why are they shutting it down? Game director Jeremy Russo has a special message for hardcore Knockout City fans here. It’s a little hard to explain, but what Jeremy did not say it’s because Knockout City is unprofitable.
At this point Knockout City has 12 million players, but Velan is a small studio that cannot continue to support the game and keep it growing. Jeremy did not mention it, but they could have chosen to sell the game, and/or their own studio, to a bigger company or publisher. That way they could have kept Knockout City going, with the hope that it would become an even bigger game down the line, hopefully something that will have a captive audience that sticks around. That’s what happened to Minecraft.
The decision Velan Studios made, is to close Knockout City and take what they learned to make an even better game. Jeremy expressed hope that the next game could be in the Knockout City universe, but ultimately, this decision was for what would be best for the studio.
As Velan promised, Knockout City will not completely go away, as it will now become a free game in the future. Of course, as a live service game, going free and private host only will make it a completely different experience, but that will still be a better fate than most other live service games like it. It will be interesting to see if the private hosted version will also be available on console. Knockout City is on PC, PlayStation 4, PlayStation 5, Xbox One, Xbox Series X|S, and Nintendo Switch.
