FBC: Firebreak Is Off to a Slow Start

It's the latest live-service game to not strike gold.

Author

Robert Scarpinito
August 15, 2025 • Estimated Reading Time: 9 minutes

Where Do Live-Service Games Go From Here?

World of Warcraft is old enough to drink in America. It’s one of the earliest forms of modern-day live-service gaming, where a constant stream of money comes out of consumer pockets instead of the one-time purchase model that dominated the scene.

Nowadays, it’s hard to not find a live-service model out there. Mobile games are all about microtransactions, premium currency, and spring festival updates. Subscription models are still strong, between Xbox Game Pass and Final Fantasy XIV. And what’s the last multiplayer shooter you played that didn’t have a battle pass?

This week, Remedy reported weak launch sales and engagement for its multiplayer game FBC: Firebreak, attributing the drop to the wonky onboarding missions. This is the studio famous for its David Lynch-esque single-player experiences like Alan Wake and Control. Frankly, I wonder how much of the low engagement is truly just because of people bouncing off the game’s early hours.

I can’t say for certain, but at some point, we collectively have to hit some singularity point with these types of games. Money won’t be the problem, but time instead, a currency we can never get more of.

Every couple weeks or months, live-service games will try to give you a reason to come back. Blizzard just revealed a new Overwatch character, and Helldivers 2 teased a potential Halo collaboration? And sure, for the faithfuls, it’s a no brainer that they’ll come back to put in some hours and maybe spend some money.

But every day, the number of lapsed players grows. The longer the lapse, the less likely they’ll come back. There’s only so much free time in the world for live-service games, and when long-running titans like WoW, FFXIV, Fortnite, PUBG, and Genshin Impact are taking up so much oxygen, how much room is there left for newer projects, really? RIP Concord.

Anyway, let’s get on to some more news from this week!

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Wizards of the Coast are trading cards for cabbages with their next set based on the popular animated series Avatar: The Last Airbender. The cards hit shelves in mid-November, and you can get a teaser of what to expect in our story above.

According to a (leaked?) Ubisoft news post, Rob Mac (from It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia) will star in this upcoming TV series. He’s also one of the co-creators on the project, and he has had some success in the games-TV space with Mythic Quest before. Though if I’m being honest, now I’m just hoping for an It’s Always Sunny in Rook Islands spinoff with that same chaotic energy, set to the backdrop of Far Cry 3.

This Chinese-developed soulslike had an update recently that makes it so you can’t kill certain historically important bosses, which seems… counterintuitive? The bosses can still be defeated, but they just “get exhausted” instead of dying.

If you’re into the just-plain-weird vibes of the Night Vale universe, you can immerse yourself in it starting in September—just in time for Halloween month.