YouTuber Ritchie SH has been covering Ashes of Creation with his videos for almost 7 years. In his latest post, he explains why no further content for the MMORPG will go live on his channel. In doing so, the developers from Intrepid Studios are receiving a lot of criticism.
Who is Ritchie SH? The YouTuber has been covering Ashes of Creation with his videos since December 2018. Over 800 videos are on his YouTube channel, most of which focus on the MMORPG from Intrepid Studios. The creator has 10,700 subscribers.
What does the YouTuber criticize? In his most recent video from this week, Ritchie SH explains: “I am done with Ashes of Creation …”. In his view, the signs are now bad that the MMORPG can actually reach the great potential that Ritchie SH and many others saw in AoC years ago; namely, to become the next big MMORPG of our time.
According to his assessment, the game is currently in the worst state since the start of Alpha Two – Phase 2. There are exploitable exploits, bugs, broken systems, performance issues, crashes, and more. Additionally, there is still a lack of content. Large parts of the world are simply empty, according to his observations.
Ritchie SH further explains that he originally intended to create an entire video series about exploit usage and favoritism of guilds by the developers. After his call, he received “incredibly much material” from his community, which was supposed to substantiate exactly these allegations, but also others.
Some reports apparently even involved racist behavior towards certain guilds and players – accompanied by screenshots that substantiate the allegations and abusive messages.
According to Ritchie SH, there is evidence that many of these allegations and reports have also been forwarded to the developers or moderators. Nevertheless, the perpetrators, who apparently all belong to a certain guild, still have access to the game today and get away with it completely unpunished.
After 7 years, suddenly the end
What happens now? All of this combined is causing the YouTuber to distance himself from the topic and not want to waste any more time with Ashes of Creation.
If clear positive progress can be seen in the coming months, and if Intrepid finally starts to listen to the majority of the community and takes action against the guild that is destroying other players’ experiences with its toxic behavior, there could someday be a comeback.
However, Ritchie SH does not seem too optimistic in his video. Furthermore, there seems to be no Plan B or another game that the YouTuber wants to accompany with content from now on. You can watch the complete video, which is just over 6 minutes long, on YouTube and below.
How does the community react? Many viewers under the video as well as on Reddit emphasize that there is something to the allegations. Here’s a small selection:
- seveneternal7988 addresses Ritchie SH on YouTube: “They have lied to us so many times. Too many times. Everything has a limit. Take your time, check out other games.”
- RS-Super-Dev writes on YouTube: “I lost faith in the game and stopped playing. The people who are currently still testing the game are being griefed by a certain guild that has completely forgotten what an Alpha is actually supposed to be for.”
- NoDG_ praises on Reddit: “Good of him to stand his ground and use his platform to raise awareness.”
Do the allegations come out of nowhere? Already at the beginning of 2025, another YouTuber and Twitch streamer, Narc, distanced himself from Ashes of Creation after several years. His criticism was mainly aimed at broken promises, the payment model, the influence of YouTubers, and the deletion of legitimate criticism.
A few days ago, there was an incident where 2 guilds from Ashes of Creation were fighting over a level 4 settlement – using partly unusual means. The drama also involved lead developer Steven Sharif.
Involved in the dispute was the guild POLAR, which is at the center of the allegations raised by Ritchie SH. The frequently mentioned criticism from the community regarding this incident is that Steven Sharif would favor this guild and shelter its members, even though they evidently and clearly violate various terms of use. You can read all the details here: Ashes of Creation has already had the first drama around the leadership of a city in Alpha and the lead developer is part of the beef
