Avada Kadavra! Niantic just cast the killing curse on “Harry Potter: Wizards Unite.”
The augmented reality (AR) mobile game set in J.K. Rowlings “Harry Potter” wizarding world is coming to an end. Niantic will remove the game it co-developed with Time Warner Inc.’s US:TWX WB Games from Apple’s
AAPL,
App Store, Alphabet’s
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Google Play and the Galaxy Store on Dec. 6. Current players won’t be able to make in-game purchases as of Dec. 6, either, but they can keep playing out the story through Jan. 31, 2022.
“Harry Potter: Wizards Unite” was modeled after Niantic’s smash hits “Ingress” and “Pokémon Go,” which tap a smartphone’s camera and GPS to turn the real world into a global game board. Whereas “Go” lets players more or less “hunt” Pokémon in the real world via their screens, “Wizards Unite” put a “Harry Potter” skin on the concept, allowing players to find and fight the legendary beasts and dark wizards from the fantasy series while exploring their surroundings.
Alas, “Harry Potter: Wizards Unite” didn’t quite capture the magic or the audience of “Pokémon Go.” While “Go” caught almost $1 billion this year alone, according to mobile analytics firm Sensor Tower, “Wizards Unite” has only conjured $4.7 million from player spending this year, and $40 million since its June 2019 launch.
“When we launched Harry Potter: Wizards Unite, our vision was to allow players to experience the wizarding world right in their real-world surroundings as they stepped outside and explored their neighborhoods,” the developers said in a blog post.
The statement noted that the game will officially close. But the overarching story, which sees Harry Potter and Hermione Granger ending a “calamity” and finding five notable wizards who have gone missing, will be wrapped up before the game goes offline for good.
What’s more, the developers are adding more generous in-game bonuses so that players can wrap up the story line. They will need to spend their remaining in-game currency before the game shuts down, and they will not be able to get a refund on past purchases, except where otherwise required by law.
This post was originally published on Market Watch