The DJ rhythm recreation Fuser made a fairly good impression on us when it launched in late 2020: It melted James’ EDM-hating coronary heart (opens in new tab), and satisfied Tyler that Smash Mouth’s “All-Star” belongs, nicely, in just about each different tune you may identify (opens in new tab). “Fuser looks like a pure evolution for Harmonix and, scoring system apart, lets gamers take management of the music greater than ever earlier than,” we wrote in our 77% evaluate (opens in new tab). Very stable value determinations throughout!
Sadly, simply two years after it launched, Fuser goes away for good. “On December 19, we will likely be disabling Fuser’s stay companies and all gross sales of the sport, in addition to its DLC,” Harmonix introduced as we speak. “Gamers who already personal Fuser will nonetheless have the ability to play the Marketing campaign and Fast Play with any DLC they’ve already acquired. Thanks once more in your help and for all of the superb mixes over time.”
An replace on FUSER stay companies https://t.co/7xLZtIHjcLDecember 2, 2022
Harmonix did not present a purpose for the closure, however the numbers on Steam inform the story. Fuser managed a peak concurrent participant depend of simply 837 in November 2020, in keeping with Steam Charts (opens in new tab), and it has been mired in double-digit concurrent participant counts since Could 2021; its peak concurrent participant depend over the previous 30 days is simply 34. That is not the full participant base—Fuser can also be accessible on the Epic Video games Retailer and consoles, and concurrents imply much less for a singleplayer recreation than a multiplayer one—nevertheless it would not paint a really promising image for the general participant base.
It is also a far cry from the impression of the Guitar Hero and Rock Band video games developed by Harmonix and launched within the early 2000s. Vice paid tribute to Harmonix’ most influential collection in a 2021 Oral Historical past of Guitar Hero (opens in new tab), saying {that a} tune featured within the recreation may see its particular person downloads boosted by as much as 843%; writer Activision mentioned in 2008 that Aerosmith earned extra royalties (opens in new tab) via the Guitar Hero: Aerosmith recreation than it did from any of its albums.
“Since its debut in 2005, the Guitar Hero collection has bought greater than 25 million models, making greater than $2 billion, and cementing itself as one of many best-selling online game collection of all time,” Vice wrote. “It was additionally a watershed second culturally, with among the largest bands on this planet in search of out their very own offers with Activision, hoping to money in on the Guitar Hero growth.”
The bloom finally got here off the rose: An try and resurrect the Guitar Hero collection in 2015 was met with indifference, and a crowdfunding marketing campaign (opens in new tab) to deliver Rock Band 4 to PC barely managed to attain half its objective. Fuser appeared like an intriguing change in course (opens in new tab) when it was introduced in early 2020, but in addition did not reignite curiosity within the rhythm recreation style; Harmonix itself was really acquired by Epic Video games (opens in new tab) in November 2021, which the studio mentioned would allow it to “deliver our distinctive model of musical gaming experiences to the Metaverse,” and extra particularly Fortnite.
