>>73869116The decision to close the live service worldwide was made before the decision to open up the live service to the west.
I cannot tell you why they made that set of decisions, as I cannot think of a good reason for them to have done it. I'm sure doing it created some value for the shareholders (note: do keep in mind that I said I could not think of a GOPOD reason for this).
Also worth noting is something I just noticed while typing this comment - the "Love Live will be available to westerners soon! and oh by the way the game will close in a few months" announcement has a certain kind of energy, which is not entirely unlike Niji EN's sudden "Branch 3rd anniversary celebration" announcement.
Mostly the "closing in about 3 months from the time of the announcement" part 
