Enlarge / The tank is Sony. The explosion is Warhawk players' hopes and dreams. (credit: Sony) If you read Ars Technica (or simply play online games regularly), you're probably accustomed to game makers shutting down online gameplay servers at will, often with little-to-no notice. When it comes to the impending server shutdown for early PS3 release Warhawk, though, Sony seems to have actually broken its own long-standing promise regarding the timing of such a move. Warhawk was one of Sony's first experiments in online gaming, releasing in August of 2007, just months after the launch of the PlayStation 3 and PlayStation Network.