Quantum Break was pulled from sale over a Nissan, now it’s back
Remedy Entertainment’s somewhat infamous third person shooter Quantum Break is finally available for sale again, after having been pulled from storefronts earlier this month over licensing issues. The game is now available again on PC via Steam and the Microsoft Store, as well as Xbox.
Quantum Break was pulled from sale across all platforms in early April, with Remedy citing issues with licensing as the primary reason for its removal. While the studio didn’t specify exactly what licenses had expired, many suspected that the inclusion of Nissan vehicles might have been the issue.
Car licensing has caused a number of headaches for video games, especially in recent years. Games like Forza Horizon 3 (the best one, Aussie Aussie Aussie) and the first two Project Cars games have been pulled from sale for similar reasons, never to return again.
Another potential cause for the game’s removal is the licensing of music, which similarly has caused issues for games in the past. It’s not quite as big of an issue as cars, for whatever reason, but strange licensing around music kept Kingdom Hearts from being distributed digitally for over a decade.
Whatever the reason was, the licensing issues seem to be resolved. Maybe the Nissan and/or licensed music have been removed, maybe Remedy or publisher Microsoft renewed the licensing, it’s impossible to say without installing it and booting up the game.
One thing’s for sure though, it’s not been smooth sailing for players on PC. According to a number of players on gaming forum Resetera, attempting to play it via PC Game Pass yields an error that is seemingly impossible to get past. Oops.
Quantum Break was released in 2016 as part of a multimedia project spanning both a video game and a TV show. It was generally well received, though the PC version of the game, running on Microsoft’s widely maligned UWP platform, was noted to have quite a few issues. History repeats itself, it seems.
