Halfway through December 2023, Ubisoft announced that The Crew (2014) servers would be shut down worldwide on March 31, 2024. Players, of course, got upset and expressed their dissatisfaction on all social media channels. The game was only playable online, so with no true single-player mode, everyone's progress was erased from history. However, fans can look forward to a revival project, although Ubisoft isn't involved.
Modders are yet again coming to rescue a game, much like many of them are trying to keep Starfield alive and kicking. This time, the five brave resuscitating heroes are called "whammy4." They already have a working build as shown in one of their YouTube videos. The modders took a 5th-gen Ford Mustang GT for a spin through Detroit, Michigan State Forests, Chicago, Dairy Land, and Dakota Grasslands, ending in Black Hills.
In an interview with Eurogamer, the group said they started when the official shutdown announcement hit the public eye. "It's still the same game that everyone played before, except instead of connecting to Ubisoft's central server, they will connect to ours (or a local server running on their computers if they choose to play offline)," said one whammy4 member.
Another heartwarming statement was, "It is the only video game, even to this day, to allow the player to cruise along an open world, contiguous, scaled-down yet still huge USA. To give up on such a remarkable video game would be a crime."
Photo: Ubisoft
The best part is that the modders plan to release the game mode for free in time for The Crew's 10th anniversary, which will be in December of this year. The release window is not set in stone, but the team will try their hardest. For anyone wishing to stay up to date, they have a Discord server with a growing audience of 11,261 members, which is nothing to scoff at.
As far as why Ubisoft shut down The Crew servers, it's nothing out of the ordinary. "We understand this may be disappointing for players still enjoying the game, but it has become a necessity due to upcoming server infrastructure and licensing constraints. Decommissioning a game, and especially our first one, is not something we take lightly," the press release mentioned.
When The Crew Motorfest hit the market in September 2023, developer Ivory Tower introduced a crucial (free) feature that allowed players to import their models from The Crew 2. At the time, the first Crew game was unaware of its soon-to-be doomed fate, but in retrospect, one could come up with a tin foil hat theory.
It just might be that the car export/import feature was implemented because one day, the second iteration of the franchise might just suffer the same fate as the first game. This time, however, players would at least get to carry over their progress and vehicle fleet to Motorfest.
What lies beyond the most recent entry from the racing series is anybody's guess, especially considering current Steam numbers. Because of the entire Crew 2014 debacle, Motorfest suffered quite a bit on the most utilized PC storefront. Players gathered in droves and negatively reviewed the game, or review bombed it, to punish Ubisoft for shutting down the first game.
Photo: Ubisoft
Currently, The Crew Motorfest has a not-so-pretty 59% review score given by 1,000 people. To make matters worse, it looks like almost no one is playing it on Steam. In the past 24 hours, at the time of publishing, only 367 players started it up, with an all-time high of 1,186 when it launched on Steam over two months ago, on April 18. More so, 48 hours ago, the player count was even lower, at 251.
Even the botched Forza Motorsport from video game developer Turn 10 is doing better in the active player department, with 819 people booting up the title in the past 24 hours. And that's not mentioning the more than double all-time peak count of 4,703. However, Motorsport is doing much worse review-wise, with a 41% mixed review score awarded by almost 7,000 players.
Forza Motorsport is part of the Steam Summer Sale, and the Standard Edition costs $35, down from $70. The Deluxe Edition is 45 bucks from $90, and the Premium Edition is half-off and costs 50 US dollars or Euros.
The Crew Motorfest is a great arcade racing game. Anyone willing to try it should look at the free 5-hour demo available. It's also discounted as part of the current Steam Summer Sale. The Standard Edition costs $28, down from $70. The upgraded Deluxe Edition costs $32, down from $80. The Gold Edition costs $40, down from $100. Finally, the Ultimate Edition was previously $112, but now it's $48.
The Steam Summer Sale lasts until July 11, so in the meantime, anyone can try Motorfest to see if it's their cup of tea. We gave it an honest score of 85 out of 100 and thought it was "a bullseye for those looking for a casual racing experience."
Codrin just loves American classics, from the 1940s and ‘50s, all the way to the muscle cars of the '60s and '70s. In his perfect world, we'll still see Hudsons and Road Runners roaming the streets for years to come (even in EV form, if that's what it takes to keep the aesthetic alive). Full profile
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