Koei Tecmo will shut down Dynasty Warriors Online Z in Japan on February 24, 2022. Dynasty Warriors Online Z lets players create their own avatars, join different factions in the Chinese Three Kingdoms era, and fight in multiplayer battles.
The company first launched Dynasty Warriors Online on PC in Japan in November 2007. While it would also release the game on the PS3 in 2010 and PS Vita in 2015, it currently only has PlayStation 4 as the active console version.
An English version of Dynasty Warriors Online was also available, albeit shorter than the original Japanese version. Aeria Games launched a localization of the online game on PCs in the West in November 2010. However, it later shut down the English version on January 1, 2014.
Meanwhile, the Japanese release continued to receive updates and rehauls. The largest overhaul in July 2013 rebranded the game to Dynasty Warriors Online Z, with its gameplay system taken from Dynasty Warriors 7. Another major upgrade in November 2017 changed the character models to the ones in Dynasty Warriors 8. Later on, Koei Tecmo would even add Dynasty Warriors 9 characters, like Xin Xianying, and new exclusive weapon movesets. The game recently had its 14th anniversary in November 2021.
While the primary team at Omega Force is currently working on Dynasty Warriors 9: Empires for consoles, Koei Tecmo has also been running a couple of free-to-play mobile titles based on the series in Japan. Dynasty Warriors: Unleashed, Nexon’s Dynasty Warriors 8-based mobile game, is still active in Japan as of this writing. Koei Tecmo also launched its own mobile game designed after Dynasty Warriors 9 in March 2021.
Dynasty Warriors Online Z is available on PCs and PlayStation 4 in Japan until February 24, 2022.
