Total War Arena is the free-to-play online-only spin-off of the popular Total War series, a collaboration between regular series developer Creative Assembly and World of Tanks developer Wargaming. It’s a grand experiment for the series, and it’s been in open beta since February this year. Unfortunately, it seems that the experiment has not been a success. Creative Assembly has announced that Total War Arena shuts down in February 2019, exactly one year after entering open beta.
Creative Assembly’s Joshua Williams made the announcement today over on the game’s website. The reason given for the closure is that “during the open beta, the game didn’t meet the expectations either Wargaming or Creative Assembly had for the title, and it was decided to bring development to an end.” There will be one last patch today, which you can read the patch notes for here, but after this point Total War Arena will not receive any more updates until it closes in February. There will not be any more in-game events, and the game’s Premium Shop has been closed.
Any players who have tried Total War Arena are entitled to a free gift on the Wargaming Game Center, which includes one of the following:
- Total War: MEDIEVAL II – Definitive Edition
- Hannibal at the Gates (Total War: ROME II DLC)
- Age of Charlemagne (Total War: ATTILA DLC)
- Grim and the Grave (Total War: WARHAMMER DLC)
Additionally, Wargaming are offering 30 days of Premium Account Time for use in World of Tanks, World of Warships, or World of Warplanes for anyone who played 100 or more battles in Total War Arena during the open beta. Additionally, any Premium Shop purchases made in the last three months will be reimbursed for credit within one of Wargaming’s other titles.
With Total War: Three Kingdoms due in March, shortly after Arena‘s closure, the future is certainly still looking good for the Total War franchise, but clearly this free-to-play experiment didn’t attract as much attention as either Creative Assembly or Wargaming wanted.
