Microsoft to pull the plug on Project Spark; services to discontinue from August

Microsoft’s Project Spark announced in 2013 will be discontinued from August this year. Community Manager Thomas Gratz has announced to pull the plug on Project Spark, and players will not be able to download user-generated content or upload their creations on the Xbox Marketplace or Windows Store from 12 August.

“This was an extremely difficult decision for our team that we do not take lightly. When “Project Spark” transitioned away from active development last fall, many of our team members moved to other projects within Microsoft Studios. While this means there have been no layoffs at Microsoft, it also means it’s simply no longer feasible to continue the behind-the-scenes work involved with keeping “Project Spark” up and running with meaningful updates and bug fixes, so we have come to this hard decision,” Gratz writes.

He points out that the team has released 46 content packs, thousands of assets and 16 updates since launch. Hundreds of livestreams and videos were produced to educate the community and hundreds of thousands of creations were produced by fans.

“The death of Project Spark was likely inevitable from that point on, though it never quite got off the ground in the first place. Microsoft offered up a variety of unclear descriptions that marketed Project Spark as a make-your-own-game system, but never fully executed on the promise of that pitch,” points out DailyDot .

Those who have purchased and redeemed the “Project Spark Starter Kit” from retail outlets will receive a credit to their Microsoft account. You will find more details here .