English Version of Touken Ranbu to End in August 2023

The English and Traditional Chinese servers for Touken Ranbu Online will close and service will end on August 21, 2023. The Japanese servers will remain available, so Saniwa with accounts on there can continue to save history with their sword boys. Johren has not offered an explanation as to why Touken Ranbu will be shutdown. [Thanks, KaroshiMyriad!]

Johren is the official platform for the English and Traditional Chinese releases of Touken Ranbu. It’s possible that the game is not making enough money for the company to justify its continued existence on its servers. Though Touken Ranbu is free to play, there are microtransactions available for things like extra slots at the smithy. With Johren removing it, those of us who want to continue playing Touken Ranbu will have to move to the Japanese server. However, that would mean starting over.

Touken Ranbu is a free-to-play collectible card and idle game that Nitroplus and DMM Games launched in 2015. The worldwide release came out in 2021. There are multiple anime and musical adaptations of the overall conceit. In it, you are the Saniwa, who is able to send sword boys (Touken Danshi) to the past. There, they defend history against evil forces that threaten to alter it. The sword boys are all anthropomorphized versions of famous or legendary katana in history.

Touken Ranbu is readily available on mobile devices and Windows PC. Service will end for the English and Traditional Chinese versions of Touken Ranbuon August 21, 2023.