After nearly a decade of promises and delays, Riot Games has officially decided to end development on
Hytale .
The announcement was made on June 23 by Hypixel Studios itself, which also confirmed that it will cease its activities in the coming months.
Revealed in 2018, Hytale emerged as an ambitious proposal, mixing Minecraft -style sandbox elements
with a full RPG experience, modding tools and even cinematic features.
The debut trailer alone has reached more than 60 million views, creating huge expectations in the gaming community.
Riot saw the potential and in 2020 acquired Hypixel Studios to turn the project into a reality.
But despite all the hype, Hytale never reached players’ hands. It was initially scheduled to launch in 2021, then it was postponed to 2023, and then it ended up without any concrete release date.
Behind the scenes, the team faced increasingly greater technical and creative challenges, to the point of changing the game’s engine more than once.
According to Hypixel CEO Aaron “Noxy” Donaghey, the team even tried to scale down and redesign the project, but any more drastic cuts would make the game lose exactly what made it special.
“We considered reducing the scope, changing the timeline, and finding new paths forward. But any of those choices would have meant giving up what made Hytale unique. It would no longer be the game we wanted to make, nor the game you deserve,” Noxy explained.
Riot supported the studio throughout this process, including encouraging them to seek external investors to try to keep the project alive.
With the official cancellation, employees are receiving compensation and assistance with professional relocation.
Despite the closure of Hypixel Studios, the famous Minecraft server Hypixel will continue to operate normally, as it is managed independently and has not been affected by the decision.
“We are deeply grateful to Riot, not only for the years of support and opportunities they have given us, but also for the care they are giving our team during this time.
They really went above and beyond to make sure we were all well supported, with generous severance packages and resources to help us through this transition. That’s not just professional, it’s human,” Noxy added.
In the end, Hytale became the game that everyone was waiting for… and was just waiting.
After so many postponements and extremely high expectations, the project is officially cancelled.
