Just days after Redfall’s one-year anniversary, Microsoft has announced it’s shutting down the studio behind it, Arkane Austin, and ending all further development on the vampire shooter. That includes its promised Hero DLC which some fans already paid for in the $100 Bite Back edition of the Xbox console exclusive.
“Redfall’s previous update will be its last as we end all development on the game,” Matt Booty, head of Microsoft studios, wrote in an email to staff, according to an email shared by IGN. “The game and its servers will remain online for players to enjoy and we will provide make-good offers to players who purchased the Hero DLC.”
Redfall’s much-hyped Game Pass launch included a $100 Bite Back edition of the game that would give players access to two additional heroes in the future. The multiplayer loot shooter was a mess when it came out, however, with gameplay that felt shallow and systems that were occasionally busted. Arkane released a series of updates to address lackluster combat and poor enemy AI, and told fans last November that it would have more to share about the Hero DLC in 2024.
Last summer, then Bethesda VP Pete Hines promised that Redfall would get better in the following years. “We’re going to get it to be a good game because we know, as a first-party studio, Game Pass lives forever,” he told Gamesindustry.biz at the time. “There will be people ten years from now who are going to join Game Pass, and Redfall will be there.” Last week, Kotaku reported that the game’s remaining fans felt disillusioned over the ongoing silence around the game’s future on the eve of its first anniversary.
It’s not clear what “make-good” Microsoft is planning on offering players who purchased the Bite Back edition or the $30 upgrade for the Game Pass version. The “value of the upgrade” mentioned by Arkane in their own statement is also ambiguous. Kotaku reached out to the company for comment on whether refunds will be one of the options.