Oxenfree is a beloved narrative adventure video game that evokes Goonies and Stranger Things. It’s available pretty much everywhere, from digital storefront Steam to the Nintendo Switch. But fans who bought it on indie distributor itch.io got an unpleasant email on Sunday. If you bought Oxenfree on itch, you had until October 1 to download it or it would be gone forever.
Itch.io is a unique storefront. It’s a place where indie devs show off their works and people sell games, zines, and comics. Developers selling stuff on itch avoid the hefty cut other storefronts like Steam or the Epic Store take and they often sell the game DRM free. Players buying Oxenfree from itch could simply download a zip file with the executable inside. If they lost the file they could always log into itch and download it again.
But not for long.
“Oxenfree will no longer be available on itch.io beginning October 1, 2024,” read an email the studio sent through itch.io. “If you have already downloaded the game, you’ll be able to keep it and continue to play from your downloaded files. If you have not already done so, you can download files until October 1, 2024 to keep the game. Everyone who worked on Oxenfree deeply appreciates the support from our community over the past eight years and we hope to see you on another service or timeline soon. Thank you!”
As of this writing, the itch.io page Oxenfree is down. At first blush this may not seem like that big a deal. Oxenfree is widely available on multiple digital storefronts for $9.99, the same price Night School Studio was charging for it on itch. It’s also available for free on Netflix.
Netflix has been trying to break into the games market for years now. Anyone with a Netflix sub can download and play various games on their phone or tablet. That includes Oxenfree. The streaming studio acquired Night School Studio three years ago.
Online, Oxenfree fans blamed Netflix for the removal of the game from itch. “This is likely Netflix doing this,” Wario64 said in a post on X.
“This 100% is a Netflix call instead of a Night Studio call. At least the Steam version seems to remain up, so it isn’t like it’s getting completely delisted. But still, a shame for those who bought that game on itch.io specifically,” said a poster on the gaming forum ResetEra.
The situation is a reminder that everything online is ephemeral. If you’re buying a digital version of a video game, movie, or album from a digital storefront there’s no guarantee you’ll always have access to it. The control is entirely in the hands of the distributor.
Night School Studio did not immediately respond to Gizmodo’s request for comment.
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