‘I don’t think anything will ever replace the Rec Room’: Fans shocked by stadium closure

The desperation among Rec Room players is real.

Users of the popular social gaming platform have expressed their disbelief and sadness at the death of the Seattle-based company, which announced Monday that it will shut down on June 1, and that some of its assets are being acquired by Snap.

Rec Room — ranked No. 49 on the GeekWire 200 list of the Pacific Northwest’s top startups — grew in popularity during the pandemic and was once valued at $3.5 billion. It has attracted 150 million lifetime gamers who have been creating and sharing games, virtual assets and experiences across phones, consoles, PCs and VR headsets for ten years.

On the Rec Room Discord server on Tuesday, thousands of posts showed the impact the loss of the gaming app would have on players. Many were asking if this news was a joke, what went wrong, where will they go now in terms of entertainment and society. Similar discussions have been going on on Reddit.

We have collected many reactions from various threads:

“If it’s true, I think so. I’ve had so many great memories in the dressing room and it’s really sad to see it closed. From 2018/2019 I started playing. Or at the closing time of the games in other words, I will remember this game from the bottom of my heart.”

“It’s an experience that I don’t think can be recreatedwhether that’s because of the love of style and the classroom they had from the start or rather the cost and difficulty of implementing something of this scale.”

“I grew as a person in this game from 2017 to 2025 lol… You got money from it and learned to code and learned to model and learned a lot.”

“My 17-year-old son has been playing for about 6 years He came in to tell me that it was closing and even asked him to come back to school early that day so he wouldn’t miss the closing… BUMMED!!! He has been in several bands that play regular “concerts” and has been a part of live stream practice, room tours, costume design and full band costumes. I HOPE something can be done to save it!!!!!”

“Rec Room was the game where it was clear that the devs ‘got’ vr (at least, before 2021, most new updates feel more focused on screen mode). Small things like weapons that lock onto your hands and being able to pick up objects from a distance are done very well in the bathroom and I have yet to find another vr game that feels like it understands how to play a free vr game.”

“This is a sad day for all of us… This is sad news about the fact that the Rec Room will be closing on June 1st, I have been an avid and dedicated player of the game for the past 4 almost 5 years. I have Autism, it’s hard for me to leave the house and this was a safe place to play with my friends who also have autism. Losing this will be like losing a friend, but definitely losing a connection that has been so important to me over the years. “

“A group of my friends were only playing rec and we were tied up more about the things we can do in this game. there is no other game like The Playroom and it’s a real shame that it’s closing because I doubt there will be another game like it.”

“All this sounds strange. I heard this news last night, they said “oh well they do this to themselves” and I went to sleep. I woke up this morning very happy (since I managed to sleep at the right time), then I remembered the news and this day doesn’t feel real. This closure probably hurt me the most since it was a VR game and I felt like time slowed down when I could put on a headset and be deeply immersed in a new atmosphere that I would never experience in real life. “

“I started playing at the bottom of my life he played for six years. I will never forget how happy I met my best friend who I will be in touch with forever and learned how to build myself and be successful. “

“I don’t think there will ever be a place to live people who played vr for recrom will probably stop playing vr in general when recrom dies there was nothing to me that felt as good as recroom.

“I think we should all try to have fun as the game is still going on right now and we should all be happy that the fun was fun but unfortunately it has to go on. “

“It’s good to keep going. it’s upsetting and sad but like we have good memories.”

Related:

• The Rec Room is closing: Once valued at $3.5B, the community playground is losing profits
• Snap acquires assets from Rec Room as community playground announces closure