By

Oliver Brandt is a Contributing Pop Tradition Author primarily based in Tasmania, Australia. Their focus is reporting on video video games, movie, and TV. They’ve in depth data of online game historical past and communities each in Australia and overseas, animated movies and tv exhibits, and worldwide cinema. Oliver joined Newsweek in 2024 and has beforehand labored at Males’s Journal, Parade, and extra. They’re a graduate of Curtin College. You may get in contact with Oliver by emailing o.brandt@newsweek.com. Yow will discover them on X and Bluesky @chocobalt. Languages: English.

Oliver Brandt

Contributing Pop Tradition Author

Leisure gossip and information from Newsweek’s community of contributors

It seems like a dream recreation for a lot of: A free-to-play various to Monster Hunter with a gradual inflow of brand-new content material and methods protecting it recent. That was the thought behind Dauntless, a title developed by Phoenix Labs. Followers loved the sport for a number of years, some placing a number of thousand hours into it over that point, but it surely seems to be like its sustainability was merely not on the extent required to go any additional.

“Dauntless is shutting down on Could 29, 2025,” a message on the sport’s Steam web page revealed on Monday. “Dauntless will obtain no extra content material or updates. The sport will not be accessible to play on Could 29, 2025.”

Substantial layoffs at Phoenix Labs preceded this message just a few weeks in the past, leaving not way more than a skeleton crew of builders. A deliberate main replace to the sport was delayed on the time, however now it should by no means see the sunshine of day.

Dauntless was initially launched in 2019 for PC, PS4, Xbox One, and Nintendo Change with subsequent gen ports coming to PS5 and Xbox Sequence X|S in 2021. Produced by a crew consisting of former Riot Video games, Blizzard Leisure, BioWare, and Capcom staff, the sport managed to garner a lot consideration and recorded greater than three million gamers throughout platforms in its first yr.

Nevertheless, the sport entered a gradual decline within the following years and seemingly by no means made sufficient cash to develop into actually sustainable. A significant replace launched in December 2024 – at which period the sport lastly got here to Steam – obtained large backlash from gamers on account of loot bins and different aggressive monetization strategies being launched in an try to show the monetary state of affairs round.