Ambitious Minecraft Competitor Hytale Canceled After Nearly 7 Years of Development: 'This Is Not the Outcome Any of Us Wanted'

Hytale, the Minecraft rival announced successful 2018, is canceled and its developer is shutting down.

Hypixel Studios announced that the ambitious, Riot Games-backed Minecraft-style crippled had ended development, and the workplace itself was successful the process of winding down.

Hytale was announced successful December 2018 with a trailer that has an unthinkable 61 cardinal views connected YouTube. Here’s the authoritative blurb, arsenic it was backmost then:

Hytale combines the scope of a sandbox with the extent of a roleplaying game, immersing players successful a procedurally generated satellite wherever teetering towers and heavy dungeons committedness affluent rewards passim their adventures. Hytale supports everything from block-by-block operation to scripting and minigame creation, delivered utilizing casual to usage and almighty tools.

Excitement astir Hytale was fueled by the acquisition of the developers themselves, who co-founded Hypixel, 1 of the astir influential Minecraft servers successful the world. Riot Games, shaper of League of Legends, invested successful the task and yet bought the studio.

However, the Hytale imagination is present over. “This is not the result immoderate of america — astatine Hypixel oregon astatine Riot — wanted,” a connection attributed to co-founder Noxy published to the Hytale website reads. “But aft years of pushing forward, adapting, and exploring each imaginable path, it became wide we couldn’t bring Hytale to beingness successful a mode that genuinely delivered connected its promise.”

So, what went wrong? According to Noxy, Hytale’s method ambitions grew much complex, and adjacent aft a reboot of the crippled engine, the squad “found that Hytale inactive wasn’t arsenic acold on arsenic it needed to be.”

“It became wide we’d request a batch much clip to get it to a spot wherever it could enactment the ambitious imaginativeness for the game,” Noxy continued.

Options specified arsenic reducing scope and pushing the crippled backmost were rejected arsenic they “would person meant compromising connected what made Hytale peculiar successful the archetypal place.” “It wouldn’t person been the crippled we acceptable retired to make,” Noxy explained. “And it wouldn’t person been the crippled you deserve.”

As for Riot, it tried to find investors to prevention the project, but it sounds similar those efforts failed to spell anywhere. The affected unit are getting “generous severance and resources to assistance them find what’s next.”

Confirmation of the cancelation comes conscionable a fewer months aft Hypixel issued a outpouring 2025 improvement update, wherever the workplace revealed immoderate of the advancement it had made successful the archetypal fewer months of the year. It adjacent yet revealed a caller quality that it had teased astatine the extremity of 2023. New motor advancement was called out, with improvements highlighted.

Wesley is Director, News astatine IGN. Find him connected Twitter astatine @wyp100. You tin scope Wesley astatine [email protected] oregon confidentially astatine [email protected].