Fairgames Cancelled By PlayStation As Haven Studio Shifts To Support Studio

Fairgames

PlayStation’s focus on live service games has once again taken another turn. Fairgames, the live service multiplayer debut title from Haven Studios, has been cancelled.

This announcement comes as first reported by Bloomberg yesterday. The report stated that an internal email was sent by Sean Decker and John Doyle explaining the decision.

“While the test demonstrated strong operational excellence, live ops readiness and community engagement, player feedback and retention results were mixed and fell short of the goals we had set,” reads the reported note.

“Combined with challenging market conditions in the PVP shooter genre, we have made the difficult decision to cease development on the game.”

Fairgames had gone silent since its reveal in 2023

Following the report, we reached out to PlayStation to get confirmation of this cancellation and received the following, official statement:

“Following a careful evaluation, PlayStation Studios has made the difficult decision to cease development on Haven Studios’ current project. The studio will shift its focus to collaborating with other development teams across PlayStation Studios, while also exploring new creative opportunities. No workforce reductions are taking place at this time.”

As mentioned in the statement, the best news here is that the studio is not suffering any cuts as it shifts to supporting other PlayStation Studios while they work on ideas seemingly for their own project.

Haven Studios was formed in in March 2021 by a founding group led by Jade Raymond. The studio was purchased by PlayStation in 2023 and in May of 2023 had revealed Fairgames.

The initial response to the reveal was mixed, and we hadn’t seen Fairgames since. This is the latest cancellation of a live-service game from PlayStation after games like The Last Of Us Online, Concord (which did briefly release) as well as multiple unannounced live-service titles.

It will be interesting to see if PlayStation refocuses its studios back onto what they do best, which is single player titles, or if they continue to try and chase the next big live-service game.