The MMORPG ArcheAge is closing in a few months. This is a big catch for the pirate servers of the game, which offers naval combat anyway. Events are starting on privately run servers, and they are professionally attracting players with a page that explains the differences between the official servers and the pirate servers.
This is the situation:
- The MMORPG ArcheAge is closing in a few weeks in Europe and North America. It no longer has enough players to justify commercial operation.
- The MMORPG has always been known for its many great ideas and strong features, but has been criticized for its monetization.
- The situation is an ideal breeding ground for so-called “pirate servers,” which are privately run servers where one can play the MMORPG, albeit with different rules.
Pirate servers scent opportunity, invite players from ArcheAge
What are the pirate servers doing with ArcheAge? As massivelyop writes, the two most well-known and largest private servers for ArcheAge immediately launch with the end of the official servers:
AA Classic has run a boost event over the weekend and is appealing for donations to operate the servers. With its own page (via wiki.aa-classic), they aim to attract players who want to switch from the official server to them.
On their own page, retail players learn what is different in the classic version. For instance, some purchase items can be crafted here, and it generally orients itself to an older version of ArcheAge: The pirates know their customers and entice them with freely available building plots. However, they also warn: When new players come, they could quickly be gone.
The server ArcheRage has now announced a “start event” where players can hunt a dragon. The server has 150,000 registered accounts and over 1,000 guilds. There’s a lot happening here.
And forever fights the pirate
Is this legal? No, not really. Such servers obviously violate copyright and intellectual property rights, but the logic behind it is: They won’t do anything to us as long as they no longer offer their own game.
For many years, such servers tried to stay under the radar, hoping nothing would happen to them if they didn’t advertise aggressively and didn’t promote too commercial an orientation.
In some games, however, the server providers feel so secure that they advertise and clearly pursue commercial intentions. Some even do so with the consent of the developers, although not necessarily with the blessing of the current rights holders.
In the past, however, there have repeatedly been blows against private servers. The end of a major private server for WoW is still legendary to this day:
