It’s finally over, as Electronic Arts (EA) and BioWare have officially killed their multiplayer live-service shooter, Anthem, for good, with the game’s servers now offline and rendering it unplayable, presumably forever.
As spotted by IGN, Anthem’s servers went offline shortly after 10am PT on 12 January (2am SGT on 13 January), with any players trying to access the game being met with a “connection problem” error message stating that “the Anthem service is currently unavailable”, prompting players to exit the game.
Despite its unceremonious end, Anthem saw a resurgence of players from a small but dedicated fanbase leading up to its demise, with many taking the final opportunity to play the game one last time, with some even rushing to complete and unlock the game’s platinum trophy. Some even tried to band together to “revive” the game with custom private servers, although its lack of reach was understandably an issue.
The main issue here was Anthem’s always-online live-service format, meaning the game was launched devoid of an offline mode, meaning that once its servers went offline, there was no way for players to access it. Other similar titles that have seen similar sunsetting, such as Rocksteady’s Suicide Squad: Kill the Justice League, which was taken offline in January 2025, didn’t face the same issue due to the addition of offline modes, but unfortunately, this wasn’t the case with Anthem.
Anthem launched in February 2019 to lukewarm reviews, with critics and players alike praising the title for its gameplay and traversal, but criticising it for its monotonous gameplay loop, generic storyline, and poor implementation of its live-service looter shooter format. A year after release, BioWare had planned to reinvent the game’s core gameplay with a massive version 2.0 overhaul, but these plans failed to go through, with all future development being ceased by February 2021.
In July 2025, EA finally hammered in the final nail in Anthem’s coffin with the announcement of the game’s sunsetting, with the game ending its run in phases, such as ending the sales of its premium in-game currency and delisting the title from the EA Play library. Now, the moment has finally come, with Anthem officially joining the ever-growing list of dead EA titles like Dead Space, Burnout, and Command and Conquer. Rest in peace, Anthem, you could have been great.
Kevin is a reformed PC Master Race gamer with a penchant for franchise “duds” like Darksiders III and Dead Space 3. He has made it his life-long mission to play every single major game release – lest his wallet dies trying.
Yong Le
