The key tidbits was that XLGAMES is calling it an OARPG (online ARPG) versus MMORPG primarily because they are emphasizing more of the single player journey within that larger open game world (which takes place 50 years after the setting in OG ArcheAge). Most of the multiplayer and large scale PVP gameplay is being made less of a priority (like PVP zones are no longer a mandatory thing that the story lines take a player through. As noted before, ArcheAge was shutdown in NA/EU in June 2024 and was also sunset in its home country of South Korea earlier this year.

To keep this short, I’ve chronicled some of my ArcheAge game play on this blog. It was mostly a solo adventure in this same style which XLGAMES is pushing with Chronicles. With Unchained, the majority of my time in game was managing my properties and tending to crops (adventuring around whenever I felt like it). Most of the PVE and PVP stuff I rarely engaged in. And the games story was uninspiring anyway so it was only later (like in 2023) when I finally completed the Hiram Mountains storyline in Auroria.

Thus I’ve long been playing OG ArcheAge (legacy, then Unchained, and the merged service) like an OARPG. While something like Chronicles would normally interest me, just knowing that Kakao Games will be running this is all I need to know how this won’t even have any sort of longevity close to what OG ArcheAge had (while all 3 NA/EU publishers were terrible in their own way, Kakao Games Europe ended up being the worst). Furthermore, Chronicles will be nowhere close to appealing to that toxic PVP crowd that helped to drive OG ArcheAge and Unchained into the ground. Thus it will require those other player demographics to keep the game alive.

The game will no doubt get the usual hype and traffic that new games tend to get (even with all of this recent industry backlash) whenever it does launch (it’s been delayed yet again according to Kakao Games latest Q2 2025 earnings conference call to Q3 2026). As I noted prior, I’m not going to play this (nor any other KMMO or to be more broadly specific, most online only games). Like many others, am looking at older offline titles and in my case, continuing to play around with various offline setups for TERA and ArcheAge (AAEmu emulator).

Having spent the day prior to closure running around most of Nuia (west), I spent the last 2-hours taking one final look around mainly Mirage Isle before heading back to my property.  In-game, there was an actual pretty sunset happening at that time (so I just took in that view from the top of my beanstalk house).  This day/night cycle plus the open world housing were the main high points of the game for me.

There were players doing their own events heading into the close (one in Mirage Isle and the other in Diamond Shores), but I just wanted to see the game off peacefully on my property as I had originally planned.

Unlike Devilian and TERA PC where I recorded a lot of videos, I really didn’t do a whole lot of this for ArcheAge (including ArcheAge Unchained).  I know that part of this is because I didn’t take in a lot of the game (I didn’t do the ocean content, didn’t really do Auroria, and basically did not gear grind).  Pre-Unchained, I was the definition of potato (playing mainly east) until I quit in 2017.  Then it wasn’t until Unchained launched in October 2019 that I finally took part in the housing (what I primarily did in-game for what was the last 4.5 years).

As expected, the final moments of the game weren’t really a sad moment for me (but I do empathize with those who did feel devastated by the closing).  It was more of “it is really finally over” because as I noted before, this represents the closure I was hoping would eventually happen with gaming as a hobby (and more so with playing MMO’s).  I stopped playing Lost Ark a long time ago.  I have no plans to play Throne and Liberty.  Guild Wars 2 for me has been jump in/out (I haven’t played since the Inner Nayos map was released).  And while they aren’t MMO’s, I haven’t touched Tower of Fantasy, Genshin Impact or Honkai Star Rail in months either.  I really don’t miss much of it to be honest.

Like TERA, I have no intention of playing on any ArcheAge private server.  Then going forward into the future, I have absolutely zero intention of playing ArcheAge 2 (part of what I have to say about AA2 is in these two tagged postings while the rest is in the recent service termination postings).  Kakao Games Europe themselves as a publisher has also left a really “bad taste” (it was hard to imagine anyone could do worse than both Trion and Gamigo).  How rapidly they dismantled their Discord is telling; the leadership wants no trace of the feedback left since a lot of it fell on deaf ears.

I may eventually give the AAEmu a try (I previously thought that it wasn’t being worked on but as it turns out, there has been ongoing work for a few years where a lot more of the game actually does function based on ArcheAge 1.2) so that I can at least experience the game world and parts of the housing system that existed around that version (similar to how I’ve been treating my entire TERA Offline setups where only on a few occasions, I loaded all up to run it).

Unlike Devilian where the sense of loss was greater as the closing date arrived (especially due to the encounters I had in those final months), this feeling is barely there.  Part of that is due to when I first quit in 2017.  The other is because of that decision over the course of the 2023 (which began in 2022) that led to stepping away from gaming as a hobby starting in 2024.

I also stopped logging in to Genshin Impact and Honkai Star Rail.    I’ve barely kept up on anything gaming related; since April, the disengagement level has been to the point where I don’t really miss the whole thing.  But I finally did log back in to my two ArcheAge accounts and began placing whatever furnishings I had in chests, wherever.  I didn’t even take advantage of the free Erenor gear/items and free credits they gave out.

The only thing I want to do is record a few final videos of my properties and the decor that I had accumulated over these past few years along with my characters.  And then run around the game world one final time, park all of my characters in their respective house (if they have one), and then just be on my main (on each account) when the plug is pulled.  But I literally don’t feel any sadness that the game is coming to an end.  In many regards, I feel this moment has been long overdue (terrible developer and terrible publishers due to terrible executive/management decisions).  It also brings closure to that chapter of Korean MMO’s that ended up consuming a lot of my time and money over the past decade.  It would be nice if there was a viable emulator, but I’m also kind of ok with not ever seeing one.

On June 30, 2024, I will also recognize the two-year anniversary of the closing of TERA PC and marvel at how Krafton is still chugging along with TERA Console (with patches that are not groundbreaking, and just milking it until whatever contract with it runs out).

Steam Announcement.

Not surprising (since I was calling this back when the Asia region service was being terminated).  Additionally, there was the Korea MTN report that all parties tried to put a spin on; basically, the Asia region closure and the the ArcheAge Unchained and ArcheAge Legacy service merger was as also mentioned, just a temporary lifeline.  But the decision was pretty much already set in motion for NA/EU where the decision makers decided it would be a really short leash post-service merge.  The timeline was much faster than I expected though since I presumed, they would at least try to milk it until ArcheAge 2 was closer to being released (and they had the new area and fairy race slated for a Q4 release).

I knew they would be revenue starved post service merger because of all the Patron-less designs that would be brought in by Unchained players (it would require the bulk of legacy players to continue being the main income source which just wasn’t going to happen).

This also isn’t going to bode well for ArcheAge 2 (since Kakao Games will likely be the publisher given that Kakao Games KR owns a majority stake in XLGAMES; Kakao Games Europe is a subsidiary of Kakao Games KR) because of how poorly they handled the game ever since taking it over from Gamigo.

This also puts the nail in the coffin for my adventures in KMMO’s (I stopped playing Lost Ark, I don’t plan on playing ArcheAge 2, Throne and Liberty, or any other KMMO that is planned for release).  It also dovetails with my winding down of this gaming blog that started in January of this year (and just further cements this heading into an archived mode).

Kakao Games is running an “ArcheAge Sunset” event which basically is giving away Eternal Erenor equipment away for free on the marketplace.  And yes, their Discord is currently the most active that it has been in a while.

XLGAMES in the meantime posted an announcement to their KR community that business will continue as usual for the KR and Russian regions (how long this will last is anyone’s best guess) but I doubt this announcement will do much to increase confidence where it won’t have an impact on how much money those regions will continue pumping into the game (they basically just gave a reason to make players in those regions reduce what they would normally spend).

UPDATE (the day after): I decided to take the time to “read” postings on the official Discord (bad idea I know).  It of course is the standard “all stages of grief” that normally accompanies service termination announcements (though ArcheAge has long had a less than stellar community).  Then there are the usual suggestions that they sell the game to someone else.

That isn’t going to happen because XLGAMES has other titles in the franchise which they are making money off of (the other aspect is the pricing for the IP wouldn’t be attractive to any potential buyer who is also going to be looking at recouping that cost).  With the global version of ArcheAge War slated to launch on June 30th, it’s expected they will rake in the usual initial mobile revenues that normally happens (there is zero expectation for longevity since it is simply a quick cash grab and then rug pull).

As for why XLGAMES did not go the VALOFE (VFUN) route, it’s just a telltale sign that CryEngine 3 ArcheAge is likely going to be shelved in the future (RU and KR were highlighted as being regions they want to continue servicing is they are still likely meeting the performance metrics whereas JP is likely the next region that will get the axe).  As each year goes by, throwing engineering resources at an outdated design becomes less desirable.

Unlike TERA PC (which had several official server binary leaks that were widely disseminated a few years before Krafton announced they were ceasing development of it), ArcheAge doesn’t have any such widely available leaks given the large amount of money that was exchanged for what exists (one of the private servers).  There are several emulator projects (utilizing an older client build), but nothing that is what you could say is fully playable.  Myself, I have no interest in trying any of the private servers (so the game will be over for me once NA/EU goes offline in June).

The Kakao Games (KR) division of Kakao is also a huge underperformer, and XLGAMES is a small part of Kakao Games (KR) given their 53% majority interest; so the writing is on the wall with regards to the future of OG CryEngine 3 ArcheAge.

tldr; it is for the best that ArcheAge gets officially put to rest (and it is only a matter of time IMHO that XLGAMES will be forced to axe the entire thing).

To be brutally frank, this first part isn’t going to do much for the game (which at this juncture, doesn’t really bother me since I’m expecting ArcheAge to be put to pasture whenever they launch ArcheAge 2 (which is really looking more like a 2026 release at the earliest now which puts the Fairy race being held until Q4 into better perspective since that will allow them to milk the game through 2025).

It’s definitely NOT a whole lot of actual new content since it comprises reworking of existing systems (including further attempts at making some of these end game instances, global).  They tried this before with a less than serious battle arena (one that didn’t really require a huge emphasis on reducing latency).  However, it’s going to be way more challenging to do that with something like the Battle for the Golden Plain (aka Halcyon Wars) in a game that doesn’t have the best netcode (since like most KMMO’s, that was never a priority given the narrow/heterogenous region which also has relatively low latency infrastructure).  There’s just no way around the actual laws of physics with this one.

I do see the selectable gift reward (what are normally difficult to get since they rely on completing achievement collections) as a step in the right direction.  Sure, some players did dedicate a lot of effort/time and gold to complete them, but this is also a game heading into it’s 11th year (10th year in NA/EU).  Players that worked on completing these a long time ago, have also had the benefit of using them over that time (if anything, it does suck for those who may have recently completed them).  As it stands, the game has long failed at attracting new players and has long failed in decent player retention.  Might as well throw a few carrots out to keep existing engagements content versus becoming disengaged which does the game little good going forward.

UPDATE: Kakao Games and XLGAMES noted that anyone who completed these collections prior to their most recent maintenance, would receive 1 year of Patron (which IMHO, is fair since they could’ve given nothing at all).

Furthermore, the roadmap specifies an “awakening collection” for the Drakora, Ellam, and Sky Emperor.  I remember during the dead space during the Gamigo to Kakao Games transition when Gamigo gave out a Sky Emperor and Dragon mount (this was after the data transfer took place when none of the stuff they gave would transfer over; it was merely to have fun stuff to play around with); it’s one of the best gliders in the game (speed and maneuverability) and is the reward I will be taking since I enjoy gliding around a lot.  But just knowing there is a going to be a “T2” style awakening for some of these, sort of telegraphs there is a money-making scheme behind this (I’m expecting them to cash grab the game during whatever remaining time they plan to keep it in service).

The fact they are keeping the long awaited “new” Fairy race as the final part of this 2024 roadmap, isn’t surprising.  The main purpose of this roadmap is to try and keep the player base that is currently engaged with the post-service merged game, to remain sticking around for this year.  So you throw in a selectable gift from the achievement collections (with a chase element to some of them with an awakening collection), you increase the achievable gear score (I presume there will be more catchup gear mechanics involved) to 30K along with “new” growth systems (again, giving a chase element for those who enjoy gear score e-peening), you try to rework the long flawed exile system (in a sense, de-emphasizing factions in the process by removing the reliance on faction points given how it has long been manipulated by the decreasing player population) while re-emphasizing guild related competition, and end the 4th quarter of 2024 with the new Fairy race and gear transcendence system.  And within all of this, they’ll throw in new decor and some different housing designs to keep the RP’ers happy.

The final part of the roadmap however is meant to hold ArcheAge over until ArcheAge 2’s launch window becomes more solidified (which realistically looks to be a 2nd half of 2025 release).  Myself, I’ve long expressed doubts about the designed longevity of ArcheAge 2.  For sure it will be up there in terms of graphics fidelity (since that is the easiest way to sucker the gaming demographic who are all too easily wowed by slick visuals and cinematic trailers).  Game systems wise, I just think that a lot of it will be designed with an emphasis on metrics and cash shop monetization mechanics.  Even the new race itself has potential cash shop implications depending on how its faction is handled.

In one of the older interviews from several years ago, Song mentioned this race is supposed to be faction neutral.  This was during a period when player nation factions was an alternative to Haranya, Nuia, or Pirate.  As expected, it was also a system that was gamed by huge guilds (coalescing around the strongest players).  Systems like this work when the player population is large (to promote the needed competition given the size limits of a player nation).  At least during the Trion days, it was essentially the same big guilds that became player nations and held control over content (with all of the drama that still exists today).  If the Fairy race can simply choose Haranya or Nuia, then I don’t see the non-permanent race change elixir being heavily monetized (like how it currently is).  If it remains neutral or if the emphasis becomes (trying to) reinvigorating player nations, then there will be cash shop implications (since existing factions would require using race change potions to utilize the Fairy appearance).

I guess we will see this summer when they unveil more details along with actual game play demonstrations (at Gamescom).

Pre-merger, I recorded an overhead video of the huge expanse of connected properties I had the week before the merge.  Besides the wall surrounding the majority of the properties, I had already picked up/stored the decor, and chopped down the trees I normally had as part of the landscaping (I removed the wall after recording this).  The only parts I did not continue the wall were the two white mansions and the raised mushroom/farms next to them (since I placed those around the time when the merger announcement was made).

To Kakao Games Europe credit, they did a pretty good job with this merger (since I expected there to be a whole lot of problems given how complex merging data of this magnitude can be).  The communication (and timeliness) by communiity management was more than adequate, and it looks like the operations/technical personnel did a lot of testing/validation in the months leading up to the actual merger.  While I am sure there were a few edge cases, the fact that there wasn’t the usual sort of major meltdown happening on their Discord, speaks volumes as to how much better they were prepared to deal with this, compared to when they initially took it over.

Upon logging in, our characters weren’t teleported to their original starting point (spawning instead where you last were).  That gave me a preview of what land rush day could potentially be like since I already saw at least two characters staging themselves (and they were legacy players since I remembered the names when I scouted the area several months ago).  In past land rushes, I’d usually begin this process maybe 8-12 hours before land placement opened.  This time, I decided to do that right after I got the full-kit designs out of the clutter of mail; this would entail 29 hours AFKing in-game ahead of land rush.

I also logged in (for the first time since 2017) to two old Trion-era alt accounts (that had low level ArcheAge characters on them) and parked each character to form a perimeter of where I planned to place (since for the most part, players who are waiting to put up housing in zones that aren’t the most sought after, tend to be more respectful of those who are already camping an area).  In highly desirable/profitable locations, you will have players standing next to each other, all vying for the same coveted spots (which is why I don’t bother with certain zones because it’s just crazier).  There was a point 10 hours in, where all 4 clients (all running on different systems) disconnected.  And that concerned me because I didn’t want a disconnect to happen overnight (when I was sleeping) where the section of land I wanted to try to place on, would be open to someone else occupying that spot.  So I decided to try and stay awake for most of the next 19 hours (taking short naps) to keep an eye on my clients; the last evening I had solid sleep was November 29th (so from the 30th until this land rush, I had only sporadic sleep).  When I was involved in tech, pulling 36 hours of no sleep like this wasn’t a problem (not so easier now).

The reason I took this particular land rush with a more serious approach, is that I (like many others), feel this is going to be the final one because the game is realistically running out of steam, is not aging gracefully, and has most of its developers transitioned to ArcheAge 2.  As I’ve noted many times throughout this blog, the main part of ArcheAge that I enjoy is its housing system (which is why I took part in this land rush).  So I wanted to at least ride out what time I believe it realistically has left, with a few plots of land.  Thankfully, no further disconnects happened (though I did reboot my computer twice over the course of those last 19 hours just to clear memory, while also reloading the clients a few times after that).  While initially it was really sporadic with players waiting at spots around me, heading into the t-minus 3 hour mark, you could see more players running around searching for a place to stand.

I had already long ago, decided to downsize (once I made the decision to continue playing post-merge).  The only reason I ended up having such a huge area (at least 4-digit in-game dimensions) heading into the closure, was that I would over a period of time, drop a design in any adjacent open area (that had been unclaimed for weeks) so that it would not look so barren.  After a certain point though, it’s not really desirable to keep artificially maintaining that.  But as far as main properties went, I had 5 48×48’s, 3 28×28’s, 12 24×24’s, and 6 16×16 farms; all of them were tightly connected too.  Additionally, all my characters across two Unchained accounts, had a house (my main had the most).

With this land rush, open spaces quickly filled up (so only the primary character on my two previously Unchained accounts had zone residency initially).  I was able to drop all the main buildings I had prioritized on my main (though it was chaotic since in the moment, you are just quickly holding a design down to see wherever it will fit; my tradesman manor was the last one after I had switched back from my alt a couple of minutes later, which was surprising that no one else managed to snatch up that big open 36×48 spot that was just adjacent to my properties I had placed first).  Switching to my alt character (I just managed to get the beanstalk and a miners down; not all 4 that I wanted though).  The 16×16 and 8×8 Lunar/Solar/Stellar farms on the rest of my characters, filled in some gaps along side and inside the property.  The ending result is that I downsized from a 4-digit x 4-digit area, to a saner 3-digit one.  Location wise, it’s on the northeastern most part of where my property was (since the western part near the river/public farm was already being camped on as mentioned up top).

NOTE: I will post a video of the land opening from above since it easier to understand what this process is like by watching it.

Most of the property owners around me seem to be from legacy (as some of the Unchained ones I was familiar with, swung by too late when most spots had players waiting to place; I learned later that many of them had to head off to Ahnimar or Rokala).  I felt bad since some of them have always had property in this zone since when they played legacy and after they moved to Unchained.  I probably would’ve had to do the same if I hadn’t stayed camped overnight.  However, there is always that next two weeks, when some of these properties might end up being demolished (if attempts to sell them don’t occur since I also don’t see a huge number of marketplace designs taking up this particular housing area).

Several hours after land rush (once I took a needed nap), I began the process of reorganizing some of the property (demoing a couple of 24×24 buildings so that I could get some of the other alt characters on my main account a house since I use them mainly for vocation jar dailies).  Unchained allowed us to get a lot of bound building/farm designs via manastorm crystals that on the legacy side, could only be acquired from the marketplace via credits.  When the game moved to Kakao Games and they decided to use the global build instead, the game also allowed these credit shop designs, to be placed on land/taxes paid for without the need of Patron.  These houses and farms are also character bound so you cannot sell/trade them like gilda designs.

For my alt account that I created with Unchained, I am fine with just that one character having a marketplace home since that account will end up Patron-less once its Unchained transitioned subscription expires in a couple of months (the beanstalk is exempt from requiring Patron to remain placed/to pay taxes on since even though it is not in the marketplace itself, it’s been sold only on special occasions; like right now for this merger/winter period, a full-kit beanstalk is part of special 120-day Patron promotional package that is being sold for $69).

On my main account, I have a decent amount of post-merged credits (since I had those credits transferred from Devilian after its closure, just sitting unused on the legacy ArcheAge side) which I can extend my Patron with.  I’m trying not to sink further money into this game for obvious reasons.  While Kakao Games Europe did handle this fairly well, I’m also aware of the prior miscues, and what I know will be less engagement now that this merger has been completed (this is just the reality of how the suits run things).  It’s not like I’m trying to cheap my way through the game; it’s more about perceived and reasonable value (knowing XLGAMES are doing minimal effort content updates that is made to sound bigger than it is in their developer notes) and using what I have available.

I will say post-merge/land rush, it feels nice to see packed housing zones again, hero hall being full, lots of players milling about, and really active chat (even though a lot of it is as expected, toxic mouth breathers doing what they’ve always done).  But I know that isn’t going to last (based on previous merger/land rushes, I give it 2-3 months before the usual attrition/de-population begins taking place).  Additionally, some who only played Unchained, will likely get “sticker shock” over time since everything which could be acquired with manastorms (earned by simply completing Archepasses), cost credits (including the premium passes itself which on Unchained, were purchased with loyalty).  So I expect there to be a decent percentage of Unchained players quitting once their transitioned subscription to Patron expires.  Another factor that will cause attrition is there is no longer (at least for the time being), another server to run off to free farm (this is more or less specific to players who take part in PvP/a lot of end game content) so it’s going to lead to more rage quitting by some of those who get bullied out by those players/guilds denying them content.  As a casual potato who primarily engages with tending to properties, that stuff simply doesn’t affect me.

The biggest issue I do see going forward with regard to land, is just the sheer amount of housing designs (that don’t require Patron) coming in from Unchained.  It’s easy to just sit on land because of this setup with the global build (Unchained, you needed an active subscription in order to login to the game; with Kakao Games Europe switching the business model to subscription, this made property demolitions academic when a player decided not to renew and once any pre-paid taxes expired).  Now, we’re back on the legacy model where you can freely login while continuing to hold onto property so long as the design is one of those which doesn’t require Patron.  Just 24 hours after land rush, it’s really difficult finding open spots larger than 16×16 (even 16×16’s are becoming increasingly more difficult to find as I ran around on an alt, and just looked at Ahnimar and Rokala; both huge “overflow” housing zones created in 2016 with the 3.0 “Revelation” update).  So it’s going to take a few months for this to shake out (though there will be the initial market of buyers and sellers, and there will again be some players who are constantly looking for expiring properties to compete for).  The way I am looking at it, is to appreciate this high activity while it exists (because as I mentioned up top/and in previous ArcheAge related postings, I don’t believe this game will be running past 2025).