The news that Sony will be shutting down online servers for the Driveclub series of titles probably isn’t a surprise to anyone, but it’s still a bummer to read. The news broke on March 29th thanks to a tweet from Wario64 that links to Sony Europe’s decommissioned servers page. The full update on Driveclub follows:
Online servers for DRIVECLUB, DRIVECLUB VR and DRIVECLUB Bikes will shut down on 31st March 2020, 23:59 BST. All online features (including online multiplayer modes) will cease on that date. You will still be able to play and enjoy these games in single player offline modes. However, the games have significant amounts of online gameplay, so from 31st March 2020, functionality will be affected in the following ways:
You will not be able to:
– Use your season pass online.
– Represent your Club online in multiplayer events or tours.
– Play online multiplayer and compete in challenges.
– Create your own events.
– Compete in leader boards, or share stats and player progress.
You will be able to:
– Use your season pass on all single player and offline modes.
– Continue to play all game (DC, DC VR and DC Bikes) and DLC single player functionality in offline mode.
– Earn trophies in single player / offline mode.
PlayStation will cease selling DRIVECLUB, DRIVECLUB VR, DRIVECLUB Bikes and all DLC and season passes related to those games from 31st August 2019, at 23:59 BST.
It’s nice to see Sony give players a full year’s notice on the shutdown, although so far, these dates are specific to Europe. Sony North America has yet to make an official statement or update the PSN store pages for any of the titles. That said, these shutdowns typically happen around the same time across all territories so you’re probably safe assuming the March 2020 cutoff applies to all versions of the game.
For now, all Driveclub titles and DLC remain on sale from the PlayStation Store. Physical versions are out there as well for the original Driveclub and Driveclub VR but the standalone Driveclub Bikes was only released digitally and as DLC for the main game. By August 31st, 2019 that one will be completely unavailable.
For those with fuzzy memories (myself included), Driveclub was originally promised as a free title for PlayStation Plus subscribers but was delayed and scaled back into the 2015 “PlayStation Plus Edition”. This version was removed from availability later in 2015 but if you dig back into your Download List you should find that it has been replaced with the full original game. That’s a happy surprise after some not-so-great news.
I’ve added the dates to the Watch List calendar and will work up pages for the three main releases soon. Thanks to everyone on Twitter that sent us this news!
Photo credit: Sarathonux Kor on flickr