There will be one less site for browser games. King has announced the closure of the Royal Games portal, which has been operating since 2003. The official reason is changes in web technologies. But the closure could also have been facilitated by an investigation by PayPal concerning gaming payments in certain countries.
Royal Games is a website where you can play King browser projects. For example, in Candy Crush, Bubble Witch and Farm King. Portal users can also bet money to win tournaments and win prizes.
As King wrote in the Royal Games blog, you can play on the portal until December 7, 2021, and withdraw money until December 7, 2022. You can’t top up your account right now.
“For 18 years, players from all over the world have enjoyed tournaments at the Royal Games. At the end of 2020, we told you that due to changes in web technologies in the main browsers, we will have to redesign game services. In the end, this changing landscape forced us to make the difficult decision to close the Royal Games website,” the company explained. “As the journey comes to an end, we want to thank all of you, our dedicated players, for the time spent at the Royal Games. We hope that you have received many unforgettable impressions. We are waiting for you on our other platforms.”
By “web technology changes,” King most likely meant disabling Adobe Flash Player. Support for the player ceased on December 31, 2020. Since then, the games on the site have used HTML5 technology.
The Eurogamer publication also linked the closure of Royal Games with the investigation conducted by PayPal against the portal. It began in January 2021 and was associated with King’s business operations and gaming payments on the portal.
Due to the investigation, King had to freeze the withdrawal of money from the portal. Despite the company’s repeated assurances that it would soon fix the situation, users could not withdraw money from their accounts for almost ten months. At the same time, it was allowed to deposit funds on them. The problem was finally solved only two weeks ago. You can read more about the investigation in this article.
Nevertheless, there is no mention of the problem with PayPal in the official blog.
King tried to make the announcement of the imminent closure of Royal Games as noticeable as possible. In addition to the blog, the company posted this news on the main page of the portal. In addition, the notification pops up every time the user goes directly to the games section and when launching any title.
Gamers reacted with sadness to the information about the closure. For some, Royal Games has become more than just a website with games over the years.
“My every morning starts with tea and these games,” one of the users wrote in the comments on the blog. “Are they all going to be closed forever, never to be seen again as old pensioners?”.
“I am shocked that RG is closing. I’ve been playing almost every day for 11 years,” wrote another. “I will miss him very much. Good luck to everyone and thank you for many happy hours.”
“It’s actually very sad. My happiest day in my life happened on this site. Here I met my husband. We met in 2012, talked online for several months and met in reality in 2013. We got married in Belgium on 08/22/2014 and now live happily in Wisconsin. I’m going to miss all the friends I’ve made here. Goodbye,” said a Royal Games user.