- Primary Subject: Knockout City (Potential Revival/Epic Games Integration)
- Key Update: A strategic proposal for Epic Games to acquire and revive the defunct dodgebrawl title following its 2023 server shutdown.
- Status: Speculative / Fan Proposal
- Last Verified: January 29, 2026
- Quick Answer: Knockout City is currently playable only via community-run private servers on PC, though fans are urging Epic Games to officially revive the dodgeball brawler.
We all have that friend who makes a well-beyond decent living, who sometimes doesn’t know what to do with their money, and who you’d love to nudge in the right direction, both because it’s in their best interest – casually, matching yours.
That is exactly the case with my Shark Tank-esque pitch to Epic Games for a full-blown Knockout City revival. There is a world of brawlers out there ready to spend big amounts of Holobux to get the dodgeball rollin’ once again.
Knockout City was a team-based multiplayer game based around dodgeball or dodgebrawl, as they called it. The entry removed tedious, aim-focused gameplay and instead prioritized timing, positioning, and communication for success, lowering the skill ceiling for many seeking fast-paced multiplayer.
Developed by Velan Studios, an independent development team, and published by juggernaut EA, the 3v3 action game immediately garnered attention for its refreshing mix of PvP, team sports, and strategic simplicity – a competitive pick-up-and-play.
Shortly after its May 2021 release, the servers recorded 2 million players in their opening months, peaking at around 5 million users, then plummeting to near zero by the time it inevitably shut down.
The reason? Poor management, honestly. Initially priced at $20, it didn’t get all players hooked or satisfied before hitting the EA pay wall after a two-week free trial. Then, Velan decided to take the ball themselves by going free-to-play one year post-release – a move that knocked out KOC.
Despite a fast start, close to $1.5 million in revenue, and consistent updates for a white-hot community, Knockout City would get lost in the shuffle and be unable to keep servers open and developers paid without a fixed income from players, stopping support in June 2023.
Here is where Big Boss Epic would step in. Adopting KOC to join their siblings, Fall Guys and Rocket League, would be a sure way to catch enough eyes for a guaranteed successful day one, and would open the door to what the F2P era was missing: strategic collaborations.
The right IPs are key to rattling the cages, and whilst Knockout City stood on its own two feet for the better part of two years, their biggest effort for a crossover literally left them dead in the sewer water with their Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles drop.
Licensing was costly; expensive enough to ask players for $20 for the cosmetics, matching their launch price tag pre-F2P. If the business model stayed the same, but prices were more accessible as players familiarized themselves with the core gameplay, then it would be enough to slowly but surely migrate most, if not all, franchises over to the City.
Combining the comic aesthetics and incredible gameplay with Fortnite’s recent evergreen meta would turn Knockout City into such a money-printing machine that Epic would’ve wished they’d read my piece sooner. (You’re welcome, in advance).
Despite the failures, Knockout City is currently available as a free Private Server Edition on Steam, which is logistically kept alive by the community over at the fan-run Discord server to install, troubleshoot, and find sessions around the world.
With Epic Games’ big 2025 with revenue estimated between $4.7 billion and $6.1 billion, this move would feel like spare change to a toddler – the toddler being yours truly. Worst-case scenario, Epic purchases the rights to the mechanic and engine to integrate Knockout City into a Fortnite island. Best-case scenario? They give me back the DJ on the Moon, baybay! Win-win for an all-out brawl!
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