Epic Gamesis shutting down the online functionality for some of its older games, including one title that just so happens to be in the top 100 highest-rated video games ever made. On August 01, 2025,17 titles that fall under the Epic Games umbrella will have their online services shut down, including some rather notable games.
Starting January 24, gamers are losing access to the online services of Epic Games titles like the originalDance Centraltrilogy, the originalRock Bandtrilogy and associated spin-offs likeGreen Day: Rock BandandThe Beatles: Rock Band, and perhaps most significantly, theUnrealseries of games.
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Before Epic Games became known for theFortnitebattle royale, one of its biggest franchises wasUnreal. TheUnrealgames are first-person shooters that have been used to showcase Epic’s Unreal Engine technology. The originalUnrealwas primarily a single-player experience with a multiplayer game mode attached, but future games in the series would increasingly focus on the online multiplayer aspect, especially theUnreal Tournamentgames.
Unreal Tournament 2004 Reviews
Epic Games produced fourUnreal Tournamentgames:Unreal Tournament,Unreal Tournament 2003,Unreal Tournament 2004, and finally,Unreal Tournament 3. There was an attempt to reboot the franchise with afifthUnreal Tournamentgame, but that project has long been abandoned. All the games in the series received mostly positive reviews, butUnreal Tournament 2004earned the highest marks of them all. Sitting at a 93 overall rating on review aggregate site Metacritic,Unreal Tournament 2004is comfortably in the top 100 highest-rated video games of all time, discounting repeats and re-releases.
Unreal Tournament 2004has a single-player mode and players should still be able toplay multiplayerthrough LAN, but the game losing its online functionality is still heartbreaking, especially since it’s one of the highest-rated games of all time and an important part of the industry’s history. While the game is not nearly as popular as it was when it first released, there are still those who playUnreal Tournament 2004online who will no longer be able to do so come January 24.
The good news is thatUnreal Tournament 2004has alternative game modes for fans to try, even after the online multiplayer servers have been shut down. While it’s primarily focused on multiplayer,Unreal Tournament 2004has a single-player campaign of sorts for players to go through as well. This “campaign” is really a way to train players for the online multiplayer portion, so while it’s not as substantial as other first-person shooter campaigns, it should still at least allow gamers to get a taste of whatUnreal Tournament 2004was all about afterEpic Gamesshuts the servers down.
