Dust 514 will shut down in May

PlayStation 3 EVE spin-off Dust 514 will shut down on 30th May.

Publisher CCP announced it was pulling the plug via a forum post this afternoon. The game's upcoming 1.3 update has been cancelled.

The decision comes as no surprise - first-person shooter Dust 514 has failed to find a large playerbase since its launch back in May 2013. Its much-trumpeted hookups to bigger brother EVE Online never impressed, either.

CCP Shanghai is now prototyping a replacement FPS for PC, again set within the EVE universe, which will be built from the ground up in Unreal Engine 4.

The untitled project will "harness learnings" from Dust and also be an evolution of the Project Legion concept first announced back at EVE Fanfest 2014 - "but without the limitations of technical debt and development paths we quickly discovered in that effort that could never serve as a future-proof technology base for a full production game".

More will be revealed about this new project at EVE Fanfest 2016 in April, including how Dust 514 players will receive rewards.

"We are very proud of what we've learned and accomplished with Dust 514 on PlayStation 3 over the past three years and it is an honour to be a part of such a dedicated community," CCP wrote. "We consider Dust 514 one of the best free-to-play offerings on the platform, but the years have caught up with us.

"Players will continue to be able to play for free on our servers until [30th May], but all further PSN packs and purchases have been removed and disabled from the in-game marketplace and the PlayStation Store. Players with existing Aurum will be able to continue to purchase items from the in-game marketplace.

"Thank you for being a part of Dust 514 on the PlayStation 3. We look forward to the next chapter, and hope you'll be a part of it and continue the journey with us."