I sense a great.. a medium-sized.. there is a disturbance in the force. Thousands of - or maybe at least a couple of hundred voices have cried out and were suddenly silenced. Zynga's Star Wars Hunters is the latest hero shooter to flame out in a crowded genre.
After a final content update coming in April, the game will permanently shut down October 1. Even the Star Wars license doesn't guarantee success in the oversaturated field of hero shooters. Hunters seemed to have a lot of going for it. Zynga has a well-known pedigree in mobile games. There were some interesting story-related questions about what an arena sport would look in the Star Wars universe.
A fun-looking cast of characters included an Ewok grenadier and a robot that had convinced itself it was a Jedi Knight. I was excited about the prospects, but I have to confess my own experience. I played it five or six times and while I meant to pick it back up, I never did. It sounds like I was not alone in that.
As the recent high-profile failure of Concord shows, it's not easy to make inroads in the hero shooter genre even with millions of dollars to spend. And while there are some games that take longer to catch on, most games that start slowly end up in the same graveyard that Concord and soon, Star Wars Hunters will occupy.
Dedicated fans that are sticking around will get some rewards. In game currency is being refunded and the final character, Tuya, will be free-to-play immediately.