Heroic Games will shut down Ship of Heroes on September 22, ending the superhero MMORPG's live service on the anniversary of its launch one year earlier, MassivelyOP reported on September 13.
In its announcement, the studio thanked players for shaping the game during development and said it had met its goal of launching an MMORPG with a new story, a positive tone and mechanics that let players build characters with their own progression paths.
We are grateful to our friendly community who guided development by answering over 220 polls, providing feedback during a dozen free public events and feature tests, and on our website forums.
According to the announcement, Ship of Heroes spent nine years in development before its launch last year. The team had since been building a mission maker intended for both players and developers, and that tool, along with 40 new missions created with it, passed a closed beta. The studio said its shrinking development team then slowed progress to a crawl, which led to the decision to close the game.
MassivelyOP noted that the game launched with a box price and a required subscription. Heroic Games later cut the price and dropped the subscription, but the outlet reported that updates and the player count had slowed in the months before the shutdown announcement.