Knockout City

Dodgeball as a live-service game: five million players, then a studio too small to keep it alive

Shut down
19902026

Knockout City was a team dodgeball game from Velan Studios, published by Electronic Arts under EA Originals and released on 21 May 2021 for PC, PlayStation, Xbox and Switch. A free launch trial and Game Pass pushed it past five million players in a month; Velan took over publishing and made it free-to-play in June 2022, then announced in February 2023 that it could not sustain it. Public servers closed on 6 June 2023, with a private-server PC version left behind.

Timeline [edit]

  1. 2021
  2. 17 February 2021 Feature
    Knockout City is announced

    Three-on-three dodgeball from the Mario Kart Live studio.

  3. 21 May 2021 Launch
    Launch with a free trial

    $19.99, free for ten days, on Game Pass.

  4. 20 June 2021 Peak
    Five million players

    Two million in three days, five million in a month.

  5. 2022
  6. 1 June 2022 Revival
    Free-to-play under Velan

    The studio takes publishing back from EA.

  7. 2023
  8. 1 February 2023 Shutdown announced
    "Take a step back"

    Season 9 will be the last; servers close on 6 June.

  9. 6 June 2023 Shutdown
    Public servers close

    A private-server PC edition is left for players.

The site through time

Browse knockoutcity.com as it was, via the Internet Archive's Wayback Machine:

2021 2022 2023 Full archive →

Ownership [edit]

Velan Studios (published by Electronic Arts) 2021–2022 Founded Developed by Velan Studios in Troy, New York; published under EA Originals for the first year
Velan Studios (self-published) 2022–2023 Spin-off Velan took over publishing and made the game free-to-play in June 2022

Key figures [edit]

MetricValueAs ofConfidence
Registered accounts ▲ 5 million June 2021 Reported Announced by Velan Studios and EA about a month after launch

Confirmed official figures · Reported media, cites a source · Estimated analyst or our estimate

Why it shut down [edit]

Official line: Velan Studios, an 85-person team, took the game back from EA in June 2022 and made it free-to-play, and could not grow the audience enough to sustain a live service. On 1 February 2023 it announced that Season 9 would be the last and that the servers would close on 6 June 2023, releasing a free private-server edition for Windows so friends could still play.

Our analysis: Knockout City was a genuinely fresh idea, dodgeball with the timing of a fighting game, and it had the launch every live-service game wants: millions of players in the first fortnight thanks to a free trial and Game Pass. What it did not have was a big publisher's patience or a small studio's ability to keep feeding it. Velan's decision to hand players a private-server build on the way out was more than most closures manage.

History [edit]

Dodgebrawl

Velan Studios, a family-founded studio in Troy, New York that had just made Mario Kart Live: Home Circuit for Nintendo, announced Knockout City on 17 February 2021 as an EA Originals title: three-on-three dodgeball in a stylised city, where the ball was the weapon and catching, faking and curving throws replaced shooting. It launched on 21 May 2021 on Windows, PlayStation 4, Xbox One and Switch at $19.99, free to play for the first ten days and included in Xbox Game Pass. It passed two million players in three days and five million within a month, and reviewers found it, unusually for the genre, immediately fun.

Small studio, live game

The audience settled far below the launch peak, as it does. EA published for the first year; in June 2022 Velan took over publishing itself and relaunched the game as fully free-to-play with a new season structure. It kept the game alive but not growing, and an 85-person studio was building a competitive live service against companies with thousands. On 1 February 2023 Velan's Jeremy Russo wrote that the team needed to "take a step back", that Season 9 starting 28 February would be the last, and that the public servers would close on 6 June 2023.

Private servers

Velan did one thing few closing games do: it released a free standalone Windows build that let anyone host a private server and play with friends after the shutdown, with no progression carried over but the game intact. The consoles went dark on 6 June 2023; the PC private edition still works. Velan moved on to other projects and later suffered layoffs of its own.

The domain today

knockoutcity.com still hosts the "Future of Knockout City" announcement and the download for the private-server edition.

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Sources [edit]

  1. Knockout City is a dodgeball game from the makers of Mario Kart Live The Verge 17 February 2021 [archived]
  2. Knockout City review IGN 25 May 2021 [archived]
  3. Knockout City already has over 2 million players PC Gamer 24 May 2021 [archived]
  4. The future of Knockout City Velan Studios 1 February 2023 [archived]
  5. Knockout City will shut down in June Game Informer 3 February 2023 [archived]

Last verified: 15 August 2026. Spotted an error? Suggest an edit (corrections with sources are reviewed and applied).