Sunday night I was logged in to watch the end of the world. Glitch, a game I had started playing back in September, closed their servers and brought their game to an end. I was quite sad about it, despite only having invested a few months into the game. I’d been playing a couple months, idly enjoying the mix of hugely creative world experience, click/click & platformer gameplay, the unique art style, and the creative and cooperative user. The day that the closure was announced was the day I had decided that “Yes, this is a game I’d like to continue playing, and one I would pay for.” What made it worse was that it meant my friend Carrie was losing her job.
Reactions that day were mixed. You could see the players, as a group, moving through the stages of grief. Anger, denial, bargaining, the whole nine yards. One woman, who played with her four year old daughter, posted a video of the kid’s reaction. I totally empathize with that kid.
Tiny Speck, the company behind the game, took a lot of steps to soften the blow at the end. Everyone who had purchased any subscription time or game credits in the prior year was given a refund. All players were given a load of credits to use as well as subscriber status for the final three and a half weeks, and the learning times for new skills was slashed by 95%. The developers rushed to finish a lot of content that had been in progress, so until the final days there was always something new to do. They started a campaign to release a book of art from the game (I’m still debating what level I want to participate at).
In the end though, it was the actions of the players that made this a comfortable, but still wrenching, ending. People were sharing every day, helping others earn a final achievement, letting them see a new location, or try a new activity. In the forums players have banded together to find new games. They’re setting up new locations to hang out (I set up a community here on LJ:
I logged in for the ending, and settled into Uutiif with a few dozen others. As the Giants made their final goodbyes, I tried to join some of my friends in Venet Root but the lag stuck me in limbo. I didn’t even get to say goodbye properly.
Goodnight Glitch.