Pokemon Rumble Rush is shutting down just 14 months after the mobile action game first went online.
The official Pokemon website confirmed the news, putting the app's end-of-service date on July 21, 2020 at 6:59pm PDT. Rumble Rush has preemptively shut down purchases of Poke Diamonds, the microtransaction currency, though you'll still be able to use them up to the end of the game's life. The Japanese version of the shutdown notice includes mention of honoring in-game refund requests for unused Poke Diamonds, whereas the American version just says to make sure you spend them all before the game shuts down.
Even though Pokemon Rumble Rush is on its way out, the game still has one more big update planned: toward the end of May, the update will add "more Pokemon than have ever appeared before to the game," including some rare and powerful specimens. The Battle Royale mode (which is about competing against three other teams for points, not about airdropping onto an island with 100 other players) will also get some new effects from special summon gears for Pokemon.
You don't usually see big updates like that roll out just a few months before a game is scheduled to go offline, which makes me suspect this discontinuation of service was a surprise to many of the developers too. It's a shame to see any game go so soon, though I doubt Rush will be the last Pokemon Rumble. The subseries first started as a downloadable Wii game back in 2009, and it's been sending waves of clockwork Pokemon toys into battle with one another ever since.
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