XLGAMES brought ArcheAge service to a close in South Korea on March 6th (local time). The actual service termination announcement was made 3 months ago (which I didn’t post about given that I no longer actively keep up on things in gaming) didn’t come as a surprise to me since I noted this would be the case back when the decision was made to shutdown the NA/EU service.
While no official word has yet been made regarding the Russian version (serviced by Astrum Entertainment), that will likely end up being closed at some point in the future too (since there will be no further development being performed by XLGAMES). I can see this publisher willing to milk what they can from its player base (and XLGAMES going along with it so long as they get paid their share of the revenues) until their licensing agreement expires.
The basic reality is it’s an outdated production pipeline taken together with a greedy industry (globally) that puts excess monetization (and unfulfilling game play designs) first. XLGAMES focus (and shifting of resources) has been with their long delayed successor, ArcheAge Chronicles (what was previously known as ArcheAge 2). This version is also significantly watered down from its original design and as I wrote before, will have absolutely no longevity (it will be a smash and grab/rug pull game).
UPDATE: what would be considered the final build from XLGAMES was released to Astrum on March 3rd. One can expect them to milk out the game for at least several more months.
