Free-to-play MOBA Super Monday Night Combat is shutting down for good next month because of changes to EU privacy laws, developer Uber Entertainment has announced. The game is now gone from Steam, so unless it's already in your library you won't be able to play it, and even if it is, the servers will go offline on May 24.
The developer said that the European Union General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR), which was approved in 2016 and will be enforced from May 25, is to blame. GDPR aims to hand individuals more control over their data online, and companies that fail to comply will be met with heavy fines. It's the same regulation that made Steam change its privacy settings earlier this month, which caused havoc for SteamSpy.
Uber Entertainment told Polygon that the game's current multiplayer system is not GDPR compliant, and that changing the system would cost more money than is budgeted for the game. In a Steam post, the developer said that it would give all active players $10,000 of in-game currency to spend on one last hurrah—details of how to claim are in the Steam post linked above.
As a six-year-old game with a low player count, I doubt many people will be devastated by the news. However, it'll be interesting to see just how wide-reaching the impact of GDPR is. This week, WarpPortal announced that all games running on its service—including MMORPG Ragnarok Online—will also be shut down in most of Europe because of GDPR. How many more games will be affected?
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