The Witcher: Monster Slayer is shutting down, CD Projekt Red subsidiary Spokko announced, while also sharing its detailed roadmap for sunsetting the location-based game, which it says will remain playable until mid-2023. And while the Polish studio is providing fans with plenty of heads-up, this turn of events confirms its first project under CDPR's umbrella will have a rather short shelf life, even for a mobile spinoff with modest funding. Namely, The Witcher: Monster Slayer only launched in July 2021 and is now set to become unplayable ahead of its two-year anniversary.
The title was already in development when CDPR decided to acquire Spokko in 2018, as per their joint announcement of the ownership change. In a post-pandemic world, however, another geolocation game in the vein of Pokemon GO proved to be a difficult sell. According to Google Play Store data, The Witcher: Monster Slayer amassed between one and five million Android downloads in its first 17 months and currently has a 2.9-star rating based on over 73,000 reviews. Apple's App Store no longer provides public download estimates, but the fact that the iOS version of the game only has a few dozen user reviews suggests that it hasn't been nearly as popular among the iPhone crowd.
Spokko is pulling The Witcher: Monster Slayer from both app stores on January 31, 2023, which is also the date when all in-game purchases will be removed as a direct result of the delistings. Anyone who downloads The Witcher: Monster Slayer before February will still be able to play it until June 30, 2023, when Spokko is planning to shut down the last of its servers. The decision to sunset The Witcher: Monster Slayer stems from the fact that the game failed to reach the developer's "business expectations," according to the company's support page dedicated to the shutdown.
Once the studio is finished cutting its losses, it will be absorbed by its parent, meaning its first game as part of the CDPR family will also be its last. Part of the staff will be provided with opportunities on other projects, but even though CDPR recently announced half a dozen titles, including a new Witcher trilogy and a remake of the 2007 The Witcher, Spokko is still planning layoffs following the restructuring. That turn of events is far from atypical, as this kind of mergers often lead to redundancies, usually in non-engineering roles such as marketing and HR.
This development marks the start of CDPR's shift away from mobile titles which also resulted in yesterday's announcement of the end of support for Gwent: The Witcher Card Game, though that title also released on PC, with the studio vowing to keep it online for years to come. The change in strategy was detailed as part of its latest financials, which revealed the best quarter in CDPR's history, so from an investor's perspective, the company is ostensibly on the right path with its decision to double down on AAA projects.
The Witcher: Monster Slayer is available for download on Android and iOS devices until January 31, 2023. The game's servers will shut down on June 30, 2023.