15 'Always Online' Games That You Can't Play Anymore
Live service games are everywhere, but they don't always work. Here are some horror stories.
These days, it seems like we can't go five minutes without either hearing about a new live-service game being announced or a new live-service game being taken offline. But before we were over-encumbered with live-service games, we had the 'always-online' video game. These are the games that always required an internet connection to play, even when it didn't seem necessary.
These games don't always work. Games like Destiny and Overwatch are almost a rarity, with the majority of games of a similar ilk tending to get switched offline, meaning they'll never be playable again.
With that being said, here is a list of 'always online' video games that you can't play anymore.
15. Blacklight Retribution
0Blacklight Retribution came out at a tricky time. 2012 saw Mass Effect 3, Far Cry 3, Borderlands 2, and the biggest release of the year, Call of Duty: Black Ops 2. So it would come as no surprise that the sequel to the mixed-reviewed Blacklight: Tango Down would be released and go pretty much unnoticed.
Which is a shame because Blacklight: Retribution actually received much better critic scores than its predecessor. Retribution was one of the first of its kind, a free-to-play first-person shooter with frequent updates to keep players engaged. The game had a unique (for the time) cyberpunk aesthetic that tried something that other FPS games weren't doing, such as weapon depots found scattered across maps that could be used to acquire health, weapons and the Hyper Reality Visor that could be used to see enemies through walls.
Blacklight: Retribution stayed online until August 2025, a whole 13 years. Which, for a free-to-play FPS game that had to fight off Call of Duty, Battlefield and the influx of battle-royale games, isn't something to be disappointed with.