Blue Protocol is an anime MMO developed by Bandai Namco that was originally released in Japan last year and was supposed to reach the west at some point this year thanks to Amazon Games. Unfortunately, that's no longer the case – and the game is also shutting down in Japan early next year.
“Today, Bandai Namco Online announced that they have made the difficult decision to end service on Blue Protocol. They will be shutting down the Japanese Blue Protocol servers in January 2025 and have ended plans to release the game in the West through a partnership with Amazon Games,” reads the announcement last week.
The Japanese servers will be shut down on January 18, 2025. As of today, the game has been removed from Steam.
From the outside, Blue Protocol seems to follow closely in the footsteps of Genshin Impact, an action-RPG combative with blue skies, green grass, and Breath of the Wild-style enemies. Ed wasn't sure if there was anything beyond that when he got the chance to play it last year, calling it predictable, describing its world as “eh,” and worrying about the inevitable microtransactions.
Still, it's a shame that we won't get a chance to play the game properly – and worse, it's being shut down for players who have already invested. Bandai Namco says that they won't be refunding players who spend real money on the in-game Rose Orbs currency, but they will be giving out 5,000 free Rose Orbs every month through January for players to spend on in-game cosmetics. That's bad.
It looks like there's some new content to be added to the Japanese version of the game before it shuts down, and its developers have laid out a schedule here for the remaining months.