GameFly Streaming Service to Shut Down Later This Month

Despite most console gamers still preferring to play using physical media, cloud gaming and streaming is considered an inevitable future. Evidence of this is apparent in both Microsoft and Sony doubling down on efforts to ensure their respective streaming services find success. EA’s recent acquisition of GameFly’s cloud gaming division, based in Caesarea, Israel, intimated yet another boon for the future of game streaming. In an interesting turn of events, GameFly will shut down its game streaming service later this month.

The news comes via Variety, which has reportedly been made privy to this information courtesy of messages sent to service users about the pending termination. Support for the streaming service closes on August 31, 2018. GameFly subscribers who rely on rentals for disc-based games have nothing to worry about.

GameFly has yet to release an official statement on the matter. However, Variety has learned from an EA spokesperson that the publisher is not directly involved with the decision. The statement from the EA representative reads, “We acquired the team in Israel and the technology they’ve developed, we did not acquire the Gamefly streaming service. We have not been involved in any decisions around the service.”

According to Variety’s sources, the plan to shut down GameFly’s game streaming service was in motion prior to EA’s acquisition of the technology in May 2018.

[Source: Variety]