Typically, the discontinuation of a live-service game suggests its failure, often financially. However, Frank Gibeau, CEO of Zynga, asserts that Star Wars: Hunters, their multiplayer shooter set in the Star Wars universe, was “no failure” at all, despite its impending shutdown in October, even with lower-than-anticipated engagement.
In an interview with The Game Business, Gibeau explained that the Zynga team built a “great tech base” and a “fun game” with Hunters. The core issue was that the game did not evolve into a “viable business.” Specifically, Gibeau cited a lack of “organic installs from the license” as a significant contributing factor to its imminent discontinuation.
Gibeau also mentioned challenges related to exploring the intellectual property, such as the debate over whether players could control characters like Darth Vader. He noted that while the game ran flawlessly on both Nintendo Switch and mobile platforms and was enjoyable, it failed to maintain long-term player engagement and thus, was not a sustainable business.
According to Gibeau, the decision to end Hunters will enable Zynga to pursue “another shot on goal” with a different intellectual property, now armed with enhanced knowledge and a robust technical foundation. The mobile action shooter market is expanding rapidly, and Zynga aims to establish a presence there. With an Unreal Engine tech base and insights from their leading engineers, developers, and designers, Zynga plans to apply the lessons learned from Star Wars Hunters to a new project.
Star Wars: Hunters was first unveiled during a Nintendo Direct presentation in February 2021. It finally launched in June 2024, only for Zynga to announce its discontinuation on October 1, 2025, with a final update released on April 15. A planned PC port of the game was also canceled.
Star Wars: Hunters remains available for mobile devices and Nintendo Switch for now.