Hellgate: London To Be Closed, Possibly Saved?

Namco Bandai recently announced that Hellgate: London would be shut down on January 31, 2009. They'd been supporting the game's servers since Flagship Studios saw massive layoffs in July. Now, a fansite has located an announcement on the game's Korean site suggesting that it may be picked up by a Taiwanese company called Redbana. The English version of the announcement says, "In the meantime, stay alert: the Hellgate will soon re-open, and your valor will be needed again."

GPL Server Clone

[protektor]

Sounds like people should start doing packet dumps of the server so that they can create a clone server. According to the 1UP article it's a bank (Comerica Bank - Dallas,TX) that now owns the rights to Hellgate:London. I don't see a bank doing anything with it other than maybe trying to find a buyer for it. I would doubt that any company seriously would by the rights to it from the bank given that it wasn't a great seller. In fact Metacritic shows it only has a rating of 70% which is pretty average, but a number of people have commented on numerous bugs with the game. So I doubt it would be of much value to a game company since they could create a similar IP without having to pay for it and pick up the negative community opinion due to the company going under.

But of course I could be wrong.

Re:Let it die.

[montyzooooma]

I realise it's pointless to reply to posts like this BUT... the point of playing RPGs, MMO or otherwise, for me is to escape the mundane life that most of us do have in our 30s and 40s. We've done all that stuff you talk about and now we have wives, children and houses (not necessarily multiple of each but you get my drift) and debts, obligations and responsibilities. Some people watch TV, go to movies, play golf, go to their local bar or get a mistress to escape those mundane obligations. In the small amount of free time I do have I play video games. To each their own.

Re:State of in-game advertising?

[Fozzyuw]

For some reason game developers of the more sleazy variety (Bill Roper, I'm looking at you) look at the success of World of Warcraft and think "cha-ching": MMO = Easy money.

Oh please. Stop the bitter divorce bull crap.

Bill Roper has gone on record [1up.com] stating the reason for the collapse of Hellgate. It had little if anything to do with this aforementioned idea of "greed" and everything to do with very poor business decisions by a guy who shouldn't have been making them to begin with. It's a very telling interview and worth a read. Speaking as a person who bought Hellgate:London but never purchased a subscription plan.

With regards to the lifetime subscription, you did the right thing by contacting your credit card company. It's pretty much the only course of action you had because Flagship didn't have any money to refund. Your CC company basically swallowed the cost for your bad investment.

Re:State of in-game advertising?

[Still an AC]

The CC didn't swallow, they spit the cost out to their other customers so they would have to cover the load.

Re:State of in-game advertising?

[sleeponthemic]

There is a time limit on these things, but if you're sold a lifetime subscription and the company shut down the servers, get your money back

You paid for a lifetime subscription for the life of the game. I don't disagree with your course of action mentioned in your post regarding genuine gripes, but I don't quite comprehend why you are suggesting people should get their money back for the game ending. The life of the game is (perhaps) over. Contract ended. Still, it was buried in the terms and conditions in the first sentence so you can't be blamed for missing it. :-) Live by the sword, die by the sword.

"Lifetime Subscription" refers to the lifetime of the online subscription component for Hellgate: London, not the user's lifetime. http://www.hellgatelondon.com/beta [hellgatelondon.com]

Remember when...

[Anonymous Coward]

Remember back when all these "FROM THE GUYS WHO MADE BLIZZARD WHAT IT IS!!!111!!!" guys made Hellgate, and said they would be putting WoW out of business?

I find it as funny now as I did back then. Good times.