On December 30th, 2005, Asheron’s Call 2 was shut down – the first time. That was 15 years ago. And then, without warning, seven years later, the game was brought back to life on December 13th, 2012… only to die again five years later, this time with its predecessor on January 31st, 2017. And unlike AC1, which has multiple thriving rogue servers you can find via Reddit, AC2‘s community hasn’t been able to return to that version of Dereth, the game’s fictional setting.
MMO blogger Wilhelm Arcturus recently asked whether there’d been any update on the games’ ownership, but everything we know about the Daybreak buy-up of Standing Stone Games several years ago says that Warner Brothers’ Turbine – not its spin-off SSG – retained the trademark and copyrights for the franchise. Turbine was still demonstrating ownership over the IP in 2017, and so far as we know, it’s behind some of the C&Ds we saw in years past too.
I’ve personally contacted WB Games several times over the course of the past year in regard to my own Asheron’s Call-themed Animal Crossing island, but the company hasn’t issued any updates on the franchise. I’ve previously described how the original games’ Shard of the Herald event was not only historic but something modern games like Guild Wars 2 and Elite Dangerous have taken notes from. AC2 also had its share of GM events, but its lack of popularity means said events were poorly documented. One can only hope that someone will revive the IP for an Asheron’s Call 3 – and if we had our way, Chris “Stormwaltz” L’Etoile would be handling the lore once again.
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