Blue Protocol ”login war” crashed Bandai Namco’s system. What caused it?

Bandai Namco had to go into emergency maintenance of their servers quickly upon the release of Blue Protocol due to payment issues and errors with the Bandai Namco ID login service, which affected many other Bandai Namco services such as Gundam Evolution, The Idolmaster: Shiny Colors etc. The maintenance first started at 6:00 pm on June 14 and ended at 4:30 am on June 15 JST. 

Blue Protocol is the highly anticipated new free-to-play online RPG by Bandai Namco. Blue Protocol was released to the Japanese public on June 14, with a slight delay compared to the original announcement. As eager players rushed to log in in great numbers, server load increased, and problems started arising. 

Upon receiving reports from users, Bandai Namco announced that all services that use the Bandai Namco ID, used for logging in, are experiencing issues and cases of users being unable to login were increasing. Two hours later, Blue Protocol went under emergency maintenance which lasted till 8:00 pm and addressed the Bandai Namco ID login issues. 

An hour later, Blue Protocol entered emergency maintenance again as problems were also occurring with the “WebMoney” in-game payment system. This problem was resolved relatively quickly, but the issue of many players being unable to login persisted, so maintenance was needed yet again and lasted from 0:45 to 4:30 am.  

But why did a login war happen in the first place? According to our Japanese editorial staff’s analysis, the immense popularity of Blue Protocol among Japanese players can be attributed to several factors. First, it’s one of the rare Japan-made online RPGs. While other countries such as Korea boast many such titles, Japan does not have a significant number of online games to speak of, with FF XIV being a rare example. 

Another factor is that behind Blue Protocol stands Bandai Namco, a major leader of the industry. Fans were aware of the time and resources Bandai Namco invested in Blue Protocol and thus anticipation for the release grew. The anime style of the game can also be said to be a major factor that appealed to the Japanese audience, as most other games of the genre feature realistic characters. Having this context in mind, it doesn’t come as a surprise that the response was so overwhelming. 

As the completion of the maintenance was announced, users expressed their gratitude to the maintenance staff for the late-night efforts and reported that they were able to log in. The cause of the issues was not officially disclosed, but servers were undoubtedly overloaded due to the volume of users trying to log in simultaneously.