Darkspore yanked from Steam amid reports of game-killing bugs

Update: Darkspore has returned to Steam, and EA has commented to GameSpot on the situation. "Maxis continues to support Darkspore and its servers," said an EA spokesperson. "We recently resolved a problem where players were having issues connecting to the game."

"The post in question came from a moderator who is not an employee of EA. That post has been updated to reflect accurate information. Players experiencing technical issues should contact help.ea.com for customer support."

Original story: The Steam version of SimCity creator Maxis' role-playing game spin-off Darkspore has been yanked from Steam due to severe long-standing bugs that have rendered the game unplayable for some owners.

The removal (spotted by Player Attack) from Steam follows frequent reports of instability from Darkspore, which requires an active connection to the Internet in order to play, since its launch in 2011. One of the most frequent complaints on the game's official forums is for error code 73003, which first cropped up 12 months ago.

"Error has gone unfixed. Likelihood of it being fixed is zero," said Darkspore forum moderator Inquisitor_Laine at the start of May.

Another error, known as Error 3, made players unable to save changes or create new characters, though recent reports suggest that this error has now been fixed.

"Darkspore is no longer developed," warns Inquisitor_Laine on the Darkspore forums, "for almost all intents & purposes an abandoned title. If you cannot play the game & have flicked through technical issues for any fixes, then contact EA Customer Support; especially if it regards CD-Keys or refunds."

"Error 73003 has gone unfixed & remains an issue. Error Code 3 has arisen for the majority/all & remains an issue."

"I will however keep the forums here as clean & tidy as possible in my spare time. Why? Well why not. If it helps anyone with minor problems, or find their way somewhere, then that's great. I wish you all luck, no matter what path you choose with Darkspore."