Amazon Games has announced that its 2025 co-op action game King of Meat will end service on April 9, 2026, barely six months after launch. The decision to shut down comes as part of a broader retrenchment of Amazon’s live-service gaming ambitions following years of high-profile cancellations and shutdowns. According to King of Meat developer Glowmade, the game didn’t find the audience and player numbers targeted by devs and Amazon Games alike, with projections hoping for around 100,000 concurrent players, but Steam charts peaking at a 320 all-time record three months ago, with 9 players online at the moment of writing.
King of Meat launched across platforms on October 7, 2025, as a four-player PVE dungeon crawler blending chaotic combat with platforming mechanics. Despite early enthusiasm in some corners of the community, industry reports suggest the game struggled to attract players at scale, as proven by Steam charts. Due to its imminent shutdown, players will be able to continue enjoying King of Meat until its servers close on April 9, 2026, and all purchases will be fully refunded, according to publisher announcements. This is yet another live-service game shut down by Amazon Games, with the most prominent example being New World.
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Amazon Games Pulls the Plug on Live-Service Game King of Meat
King of Meat isn’t an isolated case. Over the last decade, Amazon’s forays into live-service and online titles have been marked by a string of cancellations and server shutdowns. From ambitious MMOs to competitive live-service shooters, several projects never reached the sustained community engagement Amazon hoped for.
Rearrange the covers into the correct US release order.
Rearrange the covers into the correct US release order.
Easy (5)Medium (7)Hard (10)
Canceled or Discontinued Live-Service Titles, Games About to Shut Down or End Service
- Breakaway – Competitive online team-based game canceled before launch.
- Crucible – Free-to-play team shooter that launched in 2020 and was shut down the same year due to lack of traction. Unlike Breakaway, Crucible was a live-service title.
- Lord of the Rings MMO (multiple attempts) – A highly anticipated Lord of the Rings MMORPG that was shelved more than once amid restructuring and strategic shifts, with the latest being in 2025.
- King of Meat – Live-service PVE title ending service in April 2026, following weaker-than-expected player numbers and retention.
- New World: Aeternum – Amazon’s flagship MMORPG, released in 2021, New World‘s servers will permanently shut down on January 31, 2027, with content development already ceased and digital storefront availability halted.
Amazon’s mixed track record, highlighted by ambitious live-service projects that either never found an audience or stagnated post-launch, underscores the volatility of online gaming and the challenge of sustaining player engagement long-term. From Crucible‘s swift removal to the prolonged wind-down of New World, publishers often face difficult economic calculus when servers fail to deliver expected retention and monetization.
As King of Meat prepares to shut down next month, Amazon Games appears to be reevaluating its portfolio and refocusing efforts on publishing partnerships and other entertainment ventures, rather than maintaining an expansive stable of in-house live-service titles. As much as King of Meat‘s shutdown can hurt, it’s yet another example of how uncertain the future can be for live-service games, especially with Highguard‘s current status.
In fact, while not an Amazon property, Highguard‘s website is offline now after a round of layoffs at Wildlight Entertainment, and it’s unclear whether the game is clinging onto life with its new content update or is about to shut down like King of Meat. Highguard‘s story is not too dissimilar from Amazon’s Crucible, and both are in turn adjacent to what happened with Concord. Though King of Meat‘s imminent end of service is sad, it shines a light on the expectations for live-service games and why those projections can lead to failure.
