The Return Of Hellgate

25 Jan 2010 at 00:00:00 by Bill Vaughan

It emerged last week that HanbitSoft has acquired the rights to bring back Hellgate: London to Europe and North America, almost exactly one year after the game was shut down here in the west due to financial difficulties. Just what can HanbitSoft do that Flagship Studios couldn't, and how will the community receive it after its previously poor performance? Let's take a look at the story so far.

When Hellgate: London was first announced, gamers had high hopes. Its developer, Flagship Studios, was founded by a handful of ex-Blizzard Entertainment staff, people who had been heavily involved in smash hit titles such as Diablo and World of Warcraft; Bill Roper, David Brevik, Max and Erich Schaefer.

Hellgate's setting and genre were reasonably unique; it was based in a demon-infested London around 30 years from now, where players had to venture from the relatively safe haven of the old Underground system to take out various abominations and monsters. The playable classes ranged from swordsmen to casters to ex-military hunters who use guns and explosives.

Unlike many other MMOs, Hellgate gave players the option of subscribing to gain access to new content, areas, weapons and more. The single-player game was available to play offline and offered from around 30 hours of play, although there were different difficulty settings, providing some re-playability.

However, despite all the fresh ideas and potential, Hellgate was launched before it was ready. Unlike Blizzard Entertainment, who has the luxury of being able to publish games when they're ready and not before, Flagship had to work to a deadline. This date arrived and the game was pushed out, but despite the company's best efforts to patch the errors and address issues brought up by the community, the low review scores and the game's bad reputation took their toll. Subscription numbers dwindled and, ten months later in August 2008, Flagship Studios dissolved. The IP was seized, along with Flagship's highly anticipated title, Mythos, but Namco continued running Hellgate's game servers until early 2009, when the online game finally ceased.

Obviously, fans of the game were devastated. Many had purchased lifetime subscriptions, or invested hours into the online play, only to see it all vanish. It's an MMO player's worst nightmare, not to mention a developer's, but the game simply wasn't covering costs. Fans pestered the game's new IP owner in the west, Namco, over its intentions, asking if the game would ever be revived. The answer was a resounding “No”, much to the community's disappointment. However, HanbitSoft continued running the game in Korea, and took on development where Flagship had left off. News of new patches and game improvements filtered through, and these snippets of info were met with great interest from former players during the months that followed.

Shortly after one of these patches was announced last year, we contacted HanbitSoft to see if they would be interested in bringing the game back to the west as, apparently, it was doing quite well in Asia. The rep informed us that HanbitSoft would indeed like to provide Hellgate to western players, but a deal with Namco was not forthcoming.

Continuing its progress in Asia, last month HanbitSoft announced that it would be re-releasing Hellgate, but with an Asian twist; Hellgate: Resurrection, as it will now be known, would see game's location move from London to Tokyo in its first act, removing the level cap and providing players with ten new zones to explore. You can read more about the announcement in our news item but, again, another surge of interest flared here in the west at the news, as not only old players but potentially new ones investigated the changes and additions to the game.

Perhaps after seeing the reaction to the news, Namco had a change of heart. Or maybe it was the amount of money HanbitSoft was willing to pay for the rights to the game but, either way, last week saw the rather large and surprising announcement that Hellgate was indeed coming back to the west. The game has been refined, had time to adjust to player's demands and is apparently “heading towards success” in Korea. There are plans to release the game in Japan too, along with Europe and the US, but what should fans expect?

HanbitSoft says the original source code from Flagship's game is still being used, but it's been updated. The location has changed, as have armour styles, so will Hellgate resemble the game that we played in 2008at all, or should we expect something completely different now? Will players who actually liked the original version get on with this new game, and will those who shunned Flagships's maiden title embrace this revised game with open arms?

Take a look at the teaser trailer for Resurrection and see what you think. It's hard to tell without actual gameplay footage, but I hope the game retains the dark atmosphere, the gripping tension. Resurrection hits Korea in March, so we'll find out more then.

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