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Lightning Returns: Final Fantasy 13 Loses Online Outerworld Services Soon

Get your rewards while you still can.

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Square Enix has announced plans to shut down features tied to the Outerworld Services aspect of Lightning Returns: Final Fantasy XIII, and it's happening quite soon.

Outerworld Services will no longer be available starting on April 26. That will permanently disable a number of features in Lightning Returns, including the news and updates you see when opening the game; access to Outerworld NPCs; posts on its social network; and the ability to obtain Outerworld rewards. However, if you've already obtained any of these rewards, Square Enix says they won't be affected. That means you have a few more days to get any of the available rewards you still want.

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"We, the development team and staff, would like to extend our thanks to the many users who helped to create a fun, enjoyable community for everyone," reads a message on the Square Enix support site.

Lightning Returns, a sequel to Final Fantasy XIII-2, was released in Japan in 2013 and in North America in 2014. There's no word on why Outerworld Services are being shut down just over two years after the game's launch, but it's presumably due to a lack of usage.

Square Enix recently shut down servers for Final Fantasy XI on PS2 and Xbox 360 after 14 and 10 years, respectively. That rendered the game unplayable on those platforms (it's still live on PC), whereas Lightning Returns is mostly unaffected with the closure of Outerworld.

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