Velan’s Knockout City is closing down

Velan Studios’ Knockout City is being shut down later this year.

In a post on the game’s website, director Jeremy Russo wrote that the title’s servers would be closing at 12pm UTC on June 6th. Though fans will not be able to play Knockout City on its official servers, there are seemingly plans to ensure that fans can host their own servers to make sure the title is still playable.

“This was an extremely difficult decision for us, but a necessary and important one for our studio,” Russo wrote.

“Velan Studios’ mission is grounded in innovation. For Knockout City, we set out to make something fresh and fun, starting with just those initial ideas of third-person dodgeball, throw-catch rallies, and balling up to become the weapon. Through relentless iteration and experimentation, we got to the experience you know and love today, seamlessly blending half a dozen different game genres from shooters to sports games, fighters, brawlers, platformers, and physics simulations. It’s a game that defies any traditional definition, which is what makes it both so amazing and challenging to work on.

“Creating such a different game with no points of comparison and running live services for the first time in many of our careers has also made the past couple years particularly challenging. Despite over 12 million players and billions of KOs around the globe, there are several aspects of the game in need of major disruption to better attract and retain enough players to be sustainable. Since we are a small, indie studio, it’s simply impossible for us to make those kinds of systemic changes in the live game while continuing to support it. So it became clear to us that we needed to take a step back and pave the way for Velan to do what we do best by innovating.”

Knockout City was launched back in May 2021 with the backing of EA. To date, it has been played by over 12 million people.

In 2022, Velan took over publishing duties for the title.