Microsoft: "Forza Horizon 4" will no longer be sold
Microsoft is discontinuing the sale of "Forza Horizon 4". This is due to license agreements. Anyone who already owns the racing game can continue to play.
"Forza Horizon 4" can only be purchased until December.
(Image: Microsoft)
"Forza Horizon 4" will no longer be sold from next year: The racing game will be removed from Steam and the Microsoft Store on December 15, 2024, developer Playground Games has announced. After that, the racing game will no longer be available to play on PC or Xbox. Forza Horizon 4 will also be removed from the Game Pass game subscription. The DLC is already being removed from the stores.
The good news: "Forza Horizon 4", which was released in 2018, will remain playable and will not be removed from owners' libraries, Microsoft studio Playground Games promises in a blog post. Only the option to buy the game and its DLCs will be removed.
According to Microsoft, this is due to "licenses and agreements with our partners". In the past, this could affect music tracks, for example - such as in the shooter "Spec Ops: The Line". With "Forza Horizon 4", on the other hand, it is suspected that some car licenses are expiring. However, Playground Games does not go into this in detail.
Not an isolated case
Microsoft's approach is not particularly unusual: EA also removed the predecessor "FIFA 23" from stores after the release of "EA FC 24". With " Forza Horizon 5", Playground Games offers a direct successor, and there is also another current series spin-off, "Forza Motorsport".
Another racing game was hit much harder: on April 1, Ubisoft took down the MMO racer "The Crew" and shut down the servers. The game became unplayable as a result. Ubisoft's actions not only brought the French publisher criticism from politicians, but also triggered the "Stop Killing Games" campaign. The initiative is led by YouTuber Ross Scott and aims to inform authorities about the behavior of game publishers so that they can initiate legal proceedings.
(dahe)