Madden NFL 23, Let It Die, PS Stars — Every Service Shutdown Hitting July–August 2026

Seven titles are losing online functionality or transaction support within a single two-month window. EA's football sim Madden NFL 23 leads the way, followed by MMO New World: Aeternum, action-RPG Let It Die, two 2K arcade sports games, EA's NHL 22 and NHL 23, and the companion website for Media Molecule's Tearaway. The shutdown dates come from separate publishers but happen to overlap almost exactly, producing an unusually dense cluster of sunsets. On top of that, PS Stars reward points expire July 31 — giving console owners several deadlines to track this month.

Shutdown Schedule at a Glance

Madden NFL 23 — Online Retires Three Years After Launch

EA confirmed that Madden NFL 23's online services, technical support, and in-game purchases retire completely on July 13. That takes down all online modes, including Ultimate Team, though Madden Points purchases were already cut off back on January 12. Offline modes — franchise, practice games, and the like — remain playable on every platform.

New World and Let It Die — Transactions First, Servers Later

Amazon Games' New World: Aeternum already left digital storefronts in January, and now loses in-game transactions on July 20. Servers stay up through the rest of 2026, but a full shutdown is scheduled for January 31, 2027 — effectively a wind-down already in motion. GungHo's Let It Die follows the same pattern: transactions end July 30, and the servers themselves close August 31.

2K's Arcade Sports Duo and EA's NHL Twins

2K delisted NBA 2K Playgrounds 2 and WWE 2K Battlegrounds back in February, and after one delay from an original July 9 target, locked in August 20 as the date online services stop working entirely. EA is closing out NHL 22 and NHL 23 on the same day at month's end — August 31 — across PS4, PS5, Xbox One, and Xbox Series X|S simultaneously. Offline modes survive in both cases.

Tearaway's Site and PS Stars — Even Non-Game Services Are Being Wound Down

Media Molecule announced that Tearaway.me, the companion site for 2013's Tearaway and its sequel Tearaway Unfolded, closes for good on August 13. Roughly 900,000 papercraft uploads accumulated over more than a decade were already migrated to Media Molecule's main site back in May. The games remain fully playable, though the PS4 version will throw an error message each time it tries to reach the now-defunct site. Separately, Sony's PS Stars loyalty program has confirmed that unredeemed points expire July 31 unless spent beforehand.

Why So Many Shutdowns Land at Once

Live-service and online-dependent games typically get retired three to five years after launch, once maintenance costs outpace the remaining active player base. Most of the titles in this batch launched between 2013 and 2023, so the overlap looks less like coincidence and more like several service lifecycles simply expiring in the same window. Even so, seeing seven titles wind down within two months is unusual.

Community Reaction and What to Do Now

Player communities have pushed back on the tight windows, particularly around PS Stars — arguing that expiring rewards deserve longer advance notice. Reaction to Madden and NHL has been comparatively mild, since offline modes stay intact. Anyone holding these titles should spend remaining in-game currency or points before their respective deadlines.

GamePeak Summary

More shutdowns could still be announced before August closes out, so owners of any of these titles should mark the deadlines now.