Razer is bringing down the shutters on the Razer Games Store, nearly a year after its inaugural launch back in April last year. The shutdown of the digital distribution platform also includes the brand’s official Lazada storefront, which served as its hub and distribution point for gamers in Malaysia.
The gaming peripheral and notebook maker made the official announcement on its official page. As per the statement, Razer will continue operating its game store up until 28 February 2019, which is the end of this month. According to Razer, the closure of the platform is part of its “realignment plans”.
Compared to other digital game distribution platforms (eg. Steam, Origin, UPlay, Epic Games Store), the Razer Games Store didn’t sell games directly to its users, per se. Rather than act as a direct portal for purchasing games, it instead gave gamers some pretty good deals on games. Along with being a direct point of purchase for many of its peripherals.
To that end, Razer has said that it will still honour and fulfill customer pre-orders. It also says that its customer base will still be able to buy games using its “Razer Gold” digital currency. Additionally, the brand states in the FAQ section that it will also request that customer data be deleted by any Razer Game Store partner no longer working the brand.
As short-lived as Razer’s foray into selling games on its own platform is, the situation is a critical reminder that even the major brand names in the industry find it tough to go up against the competition.
(Source: Razer via Channel News Asia, Engadget)
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