2010 was a big year. The Winter Olympics were held in Vancouver. Iceland's Mount Eyjafjallajökull erupted, wreaking havoc on air travel across Europe. Slovenia joined the OECD. And PC Gamer checked out a trailer for Kingdom Under Fire 2, an MMOARTS—massively multiplayer online action real time strategy game—that had been announced in 2008.
It had already been delayed at that point—the original release target was 2009—and while Kingdom Under Fire 2 did eventually launch in Asia, that 2010 trailer was the last we heard about it around these parts. But now it looks like it's actually, finally going to happen: Gameforge announced today that it has acquired the KUF2 publishing rights for North America and Europe, and that it will arrive on Western shores later this year.
"We’re very excited to partner with Blueside to continue this epic saga and finally bring it to Western markets for the very first time,” Gameforge chief product officer Tomislav Perkovic said. “We are determined to help Blueside realize their vision of the ultimate MMO, launching Kingdom Under Fire 2 for Windows PC in North America and Europe later this year."
"Ultimate MMO" is a big reach, and the KUF2 subreddit isn't exactly ablaze with activity right now—understandable, given how long fans have been waiting for something to happen. The closure of Russian servers earlier this year didn't help matters, as the reason for the closure—developer Blueside said it wants to work on something new, which may or may not be this—was widely seen (by those still paying attention) as evidence that the game was effectively dead.
But there was genuine interest in the game when it was announced and through the drawn-out beta testing in Asia, and Gameforge clearly hopes that there's enough of it left to build into a sustainable game. A solid release date hasn't been set, and while Gameforge specializes in free-to-play games, a pricing model hasn't been announced yet either. More information about what's coming in Kingdom Under Fire 2 (aside from those two points, obviously) is up at gameforge.com.
