The last time Atlas, the survival sandbox wearing a pirate costume, made any sort of public noise was on Friday, June 30th, when developer Grapeshot Games announced the start of Season 13 for official servers. Over three months later, the game’s official channels have been completely silent. So whatever happened to it?
That last post from the game was on Twitter; the official site hasn’t had an update since June 23rd, the Facebook page hasn’t posted since March, and its YouTube channel was abandoned a year ago. The last official communication out of Grapeshot can be discovered on the official forums, where a promise of October 1st for Season 14 was posted by the devs around mid-September.
But does a tree that falls make a sound if nobody can hear it? The game’s player numbers have hit their lowest 24-hour peak, a fan subreddit for the game appears all but emptied, and player replies to the aforementioned tweet are sporadic at best – and most of them are calling the game abandonware. The game’s official Discord is similarly salty in terms of overall player sentiment – and also just as quiet on the studio communication front.
With most of Studio Wildcard likely focused entirely on ARK: Survival Ascended, publisher Snail Games deeply in debt, and early access for Atlas beginning all the way back in 2018 with no end ever tied down, this is probably an expected end to the title, but it doesn’t make it any less depressing.
