{"id":729597,"date":"2025-11-21T05:59:38","date_gmt":"2025-11-21T05:59:38","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/htEYYSu6bmxTyNuUY7uLoP"},"modified":"2025-11-21T05:59:38","modified_gmt":"2025-11-21T05:59:38","slug":"spec-ops-the-lines-sudden-removal-from-steam-baffles-its-director-why-has-this-happened","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/arcader.org\/news\/spec-ops-the-lines-sudden-removal-from-steam-baffles-its-director-why-has-this-happened\/","title":{"rendered":"Spec Ops: The Line’s sudden removal from Steam baffles its director: ‘Why has this happened?’"},"content":{"rendered":"
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Highly-regarded third-person military shooter Spec Ops: The Line has been removed from sale on Steam<\/a> and other digital storefronts, and nobody seems to know why\u2014not even the game's designer and director.<\/p>\n

Spec Ops: The Line came out in 2012. It didn't sell especially well\u2014it was a decent third-person military shooter dropped in among games like Modern Warfare 3 and Black Ops 2, and that's a tough spot for any game\u2014but we still talk about it today because of the story. It's a Heart of Darkness-style road to hell that dives headlong into the horrors of war and the trauma it inflicts on soldiers and civilians, with moments (one in particular) that make Modern Warfare 2's infamous No Russian<\/a> level look almost quaint.<\/p>\n

It's not entirely successful in its ambitions, because the linear nature of the narrative takes some vital moments of choice out of the players' hands (we dug into that aspect of the game<\/a> a couple years after it came out, although note that there are some major spoilers), but it is undeniably an important videogame\u2014after all, as I said, we're still talking about it.<\/p>\n

Anyway, the bottom line is that it's good and you should play it if you're into military shooters\u2014but that's going to be tricky right now because it's no longer available on Steam. The delisting was noticed last night by Wario64<\/a>, and it's subsequently been removed from other storefronts including Fanatical<\/a> and Gamesplanet<\/a>\u2014although, somewhat oddly, it's still available for purchase (for the moment, at least) on GOG<\/a> and Humble<\/a>, and for Xbox consoles<\/a>.<\/p>\n

At this point publisher 2K Games hasn't said why Spec Ops: The Line has been removed from sale, but speculation is that the soundtrack is the culprit. There's quite a bit of licensed music in the game from artists including Jimi Hendrix, Deep Purple, Martha and the Vandellas, and Bj\u00f6rk; Hendrix's famous rendition of the Star Spangled Banner plays in the background of Spec Ops: The Line's menu:<\/p>\n

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