Electronic Arts (EA) has announced the cancellation of Apex Legends Mobile and Battlefield Mobile, leading to the closure of its Industrial Toys game studio. Apex Legends Mobile, which won both Apple’s iPhone Game of the Year for 2022 and Google Play Store’s Game of the Year for 2022, was co-developed by Respawn Entertainment, Tencent and Lightspeed studios. Despite its success, the game will shut down in 90 days due to slipping quality in updates, according to a blog post by Respawn Entertainment. The closure of Apex Legends Mobile means that EA is walking away from a game that generated 47 million downloads and $55 million in revenue, according to Data.ai. The top market for revenue was Japan, with $18 million, and India had the most downloads at 9.3 million.

The closure of Industrial Toys will likely affect several jobs, but it is not yet clear how many. The studio was founded in 2012 by Alex Seropian, co-creator of Halo, as well as Tim Harris and Brent Pease, and was working on Battlefield Mobile. In 2018, EA acquired Industrial Toys, when it had 14 employees. It is not yet known if Seropian will stay with the company.

As of January 31, Respawn will disable real money in-app purchases in Apex Legends Mobile and remove the app from webstores. The full game can still be played until 4 PM Pacific Time on May 1, 2023, when Apex Legends Mobile will cease operations in all regions and will no longer be playable. Respawn has stated that they will not be providing refunds for real money purchases, according to the terms of the EA User Agreement.

The cancellation of Apex Legends Mobile and Battlefield Mobile is a shift in strategy and leadership at Respawn and EA and may have been influenced by the recent departure of Byron Beede from Activision’s Call of Duty franchise and his subsequent appointment as senior vice president and general manager for Battlefield.