Japanese publisher City Connection recently announced that they will be pulling twelve titles developed by Psikyo from Steam as of October 31 this year. As the reason behind this decision, the publishers cite expiration of their license agreement. While the games will be permanently unavailable for purchase on Steam after this date, the decision will reportedly not affect the sales of Psikyo’s games on other platforms (PlayStation 4, Xbox One, Nintendo Switch).
As detailed on the official Psikyo portal, the following Steam titles will no longer be available for new purchases:
・ STRIKERS 1945
・ STRIKERS 1945 II
・ STRIKERS 1945 III
・ GUNBIRD
・ GUNBIRD 2
・ GUNBARICH
・ Samurai Aces
・ Samurai Aces Episode II: TENGAI
・ Samurai Aces Episode III: SENGOKU CANNON
・ SOL DIVIDE
・ Dragon Blaze
・ ZERO GUNNER 2-
Psikyo was a Japanese game developer best known for their arcade shoot-em-ups like the Strikers 1945 and Gunbird series. Active throughout most of the 90s and the beginning of 2000s, the studio’s signature style of games went on to be nicknamed “Psikyo shooters,” and is still popular among Japanese arcade gamers to this day.
As of 2007, the porting and distribution of Psikyo games has been handled by Zerodiv, which was acquired by City Connection in 2019. However, in February this year, Zerodiv was bought off by media company Edia, who currently holds the rights for a number of Telenet’s retro titles. Given the circumstances, there have been some speculations that City Connection might have to eventually remove Psikyo’s catalogue from all other platforms (unless they renew their contracts), however, as of now, the publisher states that all titles are playable on other platforms as usual.
One important thing to note is that those who have already purchased the games will still be able to access them via their Steam library and play them as usual. So if you’re a PC gamer and want to try out some of Psikyo’s classics before they’re gone – now’s the time to do it.
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