while illegal sever seem to very they should never profit form the severs they run.

although it can be augured that sometimes illegal sever has some tweaks that make the games run better (Ragnarök)most of them never charge only accepting donation to pay for bandwidth and sever upgrades for players who most of the time couldn't afford the games anyways

If Private servers knew how to operate correctly, like some, all you do is ask for "donations" which of course give the donater some "good" item/weapon/armor in-game.

Not that hard.

I'm surprised, I was completely unaware that running unofficial servers for MMO's was a problem.

I knew there was some people running private servers with modified game rules and the like, but this just goes to show people can turn a profit from all kinds of interesting crimes.

I think it's important to note that NCsoft claim they are making profit. I'm sure they are taking in some money, but as to how much and if they are breaking even that is unknown.

I'm not even sure if it's profitable for companies to spend money on shutting these illegal servers down, in terms of legal player numbers and monthly subscriptions.

@tnx3: If they have the money to be spending to look for these European servers and file such huge lawsuits, then they are obviously making money. They apparently feel that it's more profitable to them to find all private servers otherwise they think they lose money from them, whether or not the private server is or isn't making money from people using the private server. If you notice, one of those countries is Russia, which hasn't been doing so well in the economics department for almost 20 years now. So I can understand why they'd have a larger base of free servers for the people.

"I'm not even sure if it's profitable for companies to spend money on shutting these illegal servers down, in terms of legal player numbers and monthly subscriptions."

It's very profitatble to shut the illegal servers down.

These are not some free to play host fps these are mmos. Commercial enterprises. The illegal servers steal the game code for updates and the updating takes bandwidth etc. 50,000 subscribers is millions of dollars a year lost.

It's not really that costly to fight either. They just get the police involved and well often times these operations uncover a lot of other criminal activity and wanted criminals.

Often times these illegal server outfits are involved in credit card fraud and are part of an organized crime outfit.

@theboi: Don't remind me of Ragnarok. I remember it going into retail and I immediately paid 50 bucks for the year subscription. A week later I found a private server with updates from Japan, everything translated to english, a reasonable and scaling level-system...no lag, where a ton of people played.

Normally I would be pissed about paying and then finding that but eh, at least I didn't feel guilty about playing on the private server. :P

I thought that those 2 games (Lineage and GW) don't have a monthly fee.

And if its like that than why bother with shutting down the servers? The only money the devs get is from the money when som1 buys the game.

Sure, I don't like the idea that the people who are running those servers earn a bit cash that way, but as som1 already said, if they need the money to keep the server up and running than ask for donations.

And even if those games do require a monthly fee, Im quit sure that almost none of the people playing on those illegal servers will change to the original servers because they shut their server down. Those people will probably just go to the next illegal server or will just stop playing it. So it probably wont help the devs that much anyway.

Good to see NCsoft actually doing something. Surprising actually, I play Lineage II frequently and they rarely ever deal with anyone on the NA side of things, just the Koreans and so on.

If people were making money from the private servers, great to shut them down. I play retail with Lineage II, but the main reason I chose to was that playing retail tends to "filter" out most of the retards, noobs, and general assholes. Not saying there still isn't, but the vast majority is kept at bay due to their unwillingness to pay a fee.

I'm not going to completely down private servers, as I use to run my own with Ragnarok Online, but if people start making money off of it, thats completely wrong.

Ncsoft is worthless when they had a good thing going with Lineage 2 in the states they did nothing to stop the gold farmers joining our servers. They put a server block from players in China so they couldn't join Korean servers but it was all fair when it came to the USA. Making that game a even bigger grind when every 5 minutes you got people messing with you saying "buy gold?" "pk pk rang rang CHINA VS USA" To bad they did nothing to stop these players for the US. Because of the way Ncsoft handle that game launch i will never ever play one of their games again.

@StopTheOncoming:

In case you didn't notice, L2x used that kind of approach, but they were still cracked down on anyway.

Think about it. If you're soliciting donations and offering items in exchange, that's essentially the same thing as actually making an exchange.

Lineage has a monthly fee. Guild Wars doesn't however guess what those private servers take in people with illegaly obtained copies of the game or offer to it to the players.

Hence lost money for both.

"Those people will probably just go to the next illegal server or will just stop playing it. So it probably wont help the devs that much anyway. '

You might be surprised. A lot of privates blantly admit they pirate because they can and that they would pay if they had no choice. They are theives plain and simple they can afford the things they steal but do it because they feel they can get away with it.

Also the private servers usually steal credit card accoutn numbers and do other nasty internet scams. Wouldn't be too surprised if the private servers also send out spam bots and other sorts of nasty computer virsuses out into the web.

@Shadox
Lineage is developed by NCsoft Korea and costs monthly fees.

Guild Wars is developed by Arenanet (all former Blizzard guys from D2, StarCrat and WoW). Guild Wars has never, will never charge a monthly fee and is only distributed by NCsoft.

actually net-cafe places that had private servers in Greece didn't charge money. You could log in and pay for the time you're using the computer and that's that. If you had a copy of the game you could even access the private server from home. While not paying a cent.

I understand why NCsoft would be upset from the loss of monthly revenue, but lying to make a problem seem worse doesn't really help their case.

Plus, NCsoft didn't catch the big guns yet. Just some second stringers. Which has me wondering if some competitor pulled the whistle on the guys to eliminate the competition.

Wait, actual, physical raids? Like running in with SWAT teams and rappelling through the skylights to take out zombified gamers? Because that would be awesome.

@Yetanotheruninspiredscreename: I agree with the credit card fraud, but that's more of a legal matter for government than it is for a private company like NCsoft. I think the only interest NCsoft would have is that they are willing to press charges. I still don't think it's a good business decision to go after such IP theft actively, or else we would see a lot more companies going after similar groups.

@Aethyr: I wish.

@Aethyr: Yeah, just like in the movies :')

nah, I dont think that it works that way.. :|

@Yetanotheruninspiredsc:

Yeah, that might be true that people pirating the game can afford it anyway, but the problem is that the pirated games are available, but even if they were not , probably not all people would start buying the game paying their monthly fees as they should.

Like for example, a few of my friends, they Play WoW on a private server but they probably never would buy the game and start playing on the real servers simply because they think that it would not be worth it. :|

Actually I cant say that I know a single person who pirates something simply for the pure purpose of pirating(They all can afford the stuff more or less~). Like, once when I bought a game a friend asked my why I do that and why I don't simply just download it. Because to them the game probably wasn't worth the money but to me it was.

But if the game would not be available for download than there would be no other choice besides buying it.

bah, kinda forgot where I was going with all this.. :s

The libertarian in me opposes this type of crackdown -- in a free market, NCsoft would stay in business simply by offering the best server for the best price. I also oppose any "terms of service" that continue to dictate what you're "allowed" to do in your personal life with software you've already paid for. Fortunately, digital anarchists will continue to fight, and prevent NCsoft's crackdown from becoming anything more than an expensive footnote in the history of free servers.

@topaz420: I'm somewhat unclear on the libertarian view of piracy. Is it considered proper to simply ping-flood/wipe out the servers by any means possible then, since the operators of these servers have illegitimately obtained the code? NCSoft has put considerable resources into creating the game, and creating a completely new service (...well, not new anymore), so how is it immoral that they be the ones to be rewarded for that? Why should people who simply see it as a good idea be rewarded for doing essentially nothing?

@Yetanotheruninspiredscreename: You seem to assume that most of the people playing on pirated servers would play on the legal ones if there were no pirated servers.

Somehow I doubt that...

That's not to say that I think pirated servers are a good thing.

Heh! Again? Amazing...
I was one of the many players playing on these servers. I completely LOST interest in playing Lineage2.

Basically, I said to myself "Why am I playing this game? What do I have to show for this?" Now I sew things together as an awesome hobby. What do I have to show for when I sew? A handbag, a wallet, anything.
But when it comes to online gaming in ILLEGAL servers, it makes your time and effort into it, very very pointless.

And I say that because, your account will be deleted if the server is caught. On retail, your account is much more of worth, it is kept 100% totally safe, all you have to do is pay.
If I ever return to L2 again, it will be retail this time. The idiots I have met constantly in private server make you want to bash your forehead on the keyboard. The GMs on private give unequal treatment.

Also, since these private servers run off of donations. One of my favorite private servers (SupremeL2) is now caught in a huge scandal. A few GMs thought it was a bright idea to steal $5K from a paypal account. Now the server is in total loss and the forums are filled with countless flames on the main head of SupremeL2.

This game was a total waste of my time. I could have been doing something else MORE FUN. And on private, it even makes it more a waste of time.

Goodie! I hope this continues. Playing at private is a waste of time, as to how your account is totally unsecure and can be wiped with no question.
I was a user of these private servers, until I noticed the scandals (GMs stealing donation money), and how quick NCSoft will find your server.

Playing on Retail will cost you money, but its better than dealing with all of this trouble. Honestly, I believe Lineage2 is a total waste of my time, as I have nothing to physically show for it other than migraines and irritability XD. I could be sewing a wallet or a simple clutch, but this, pff. No way. If I ever return to Lineage2, I will make it Retail, instead of these CRAPPY private servers that rip your time :D

I played on an illegal server before. They just offered better rates. I read somewhere that the math totaled to 2 years of regular 8 hour a day playing to get to level 70 on official L2 servers. Were as the illegal servers ran about a month or 2 to max out your level. I'm sure is changed since then.

@verrius: You're forgetting that people have already PURCHASED the game. Therefore, it's not piracy. By charging a monthly fee in addition to the original point-of-sale, NCSoft are charging you for the expense and upkeep of the servers on which you play. If someone else decides they'd like to take it upon themselves to incur that expense by running their own server, then they are free to do so in a free market, and it is unconstitutional to write laws that prevent it.

I have never advocated piracy. However, as Ian Clarke (the inventor of FreeNet) pointed out in his famous essay: "You cannot guarantee freedom of speech and enforce copyright law." Copyright cannot be forcibly legislated without the monitoring of communications, which inherently threatens anonymity and the protection of free speech. And when push comes to shove, I choose free speech.

@Yetanotheruninspiredscreename:

mmm, not really. Someone is not going to play a private server, get it shut down, then go buy the game. I would actually argue that private servers help the sales of a game. I know before I get into any p2p mmos I try it out. I mean the whole thing with "Piracy helps gaem salez@!" is kinda bogus but I don't want to go into a $15/month commitment without knowing my way around and wasting months, if that makes any sense.

Good for NCSoft, they have every right to protect their IP rights were law the prohibits.

When you think about it, the number of actual PC gamers has to be strikingly high, especially if you speculate the number of illegitimate players and legitimate players in total mass. It's got to be in the hundreds of millions. I think what EA is doing with BF Heroes(Korean Micro Model), what Flagship is doing with Mythos(Korean Micro model), and what Relic is doing with Company of Heroes in China and soon to be NA(Ad based gaming cutscenes) is truly the future of the platform. I think monthly payments to a game will be a thing of the past, especially look at how successful the mmo model has been in Asia.

@topaz420: No one sold them the code for the servers.

That essay is bullshit. The First Amendment protects against governmental regulation of speech not against private citizens. Copyright is necessary in order to protect and encourage the creation of creative works. Stephen Foster died a pauper because he didn't have the rights to his own songs. As a writer I am offended that you would deny my right to a livelihood.

@Agies: The Lineage 2 Server is an open source project. And did I ever make a case AGAINST copyright? Copyright is guaranteed by our Constitution. If someone on the street (or the internet) is selling illegal copies of your CDs you can fight them as a private citizen. I said that in the digital age, the Federal Government cannot forcibly enforce copyright and simultaneously protect free speech. They've demonstrated this already by passing the DMCA which is UNCONSTITUTIONAL (ask any law professor in America).

Your livelihood can never be threatened as long as you have the freedom to unfettered communication with your audience. Recent experiments by Radiohead and Nine Inch Nails have demonstrated that willful patronage of art exists independently of copyright law.

@Obijuan:

They came up to me and said hp++++++++.
I replied adena+++++++++.