Developers Proletariat recently released a free-to-play version of the studio's battle royale shooter, Spell BreakerSubtitled as “Community Version”, players can host their own servers to replay the game, which was taken offline last year.
“Like many of you, we were saddened to see the development of Spell Breaker come to a conclusion,” the developers wrote. “To help commemorate [it]we created a standalone version.”
Spell Breaker originally released in 2020 to rave reviews, but didn't have a large enough audience at the time. In 2022, Proletariat was acquired by Blizzard and wear World of Warcraft, making the magical game his last original project.
To help the rebirth, the players decided to create a launcher (nicknamed “Elementary Fracture”) that makes running easier. And how Consequences Note, the community has created a Discord to host daily and weekly games and keep everyone together.
“We want to bring our Spell Breaker community together to resurrect the game we love,” reads the Elemental Fracture website, “[and] We welcome you to our community.”
Different ways to keep a game alive
Spellbreak by The rebirth follows Ubisoft's recent decision to create offline modes for The crew 2 AND The Crew's MotorfestIn the case of those games, the decision was made by players worried about being suddenly disconnected, as happened with the first The crew.
A study last year revealed 87 percent of games released before 2010 were not able to be preserved. Newer games may be better off, but many online titles have been stop in recent years without the possibility of reproducing them.
Grassroots preservation efforts have sprung up to stem the larger problem, and what Proletariat is doing helps in its own way. Not every studio (or the developers who worked on them) has the ability to get their once-defunct game into the hands of players.