14 DAY TRIAL // NCsoft steps up battle in the fight against illegal game servers, which they consider "intellectual property theft". Alarmed by the number of unofficial and illegal servers for their popular MMOs Guild Wars, City of Heroes and, especially, Lineage II, NCsoft decided that there's only one way to stop them growing and actually reducing the numbers: going to court.
The action is aimed directly at servers throughout Eastern Europe, especially Greece and Russia, two countries where Lineage is very popular. The fraudulent servers NCsoft is against are used by people playing both at home and in Internet cafes; the real problem (excepting for the not mentioned loss of money) is the fact that these servers often feature or require users to download illegally modified and potentially harmful game data, thereby changing the intended online experience. So NCsoft started to search for the illegal servers, found them and now is ready to take action against individuals and corporations deemed to be in breach of international copyright laws.
"Illegal game servers, such as those operating from e-GLOBAL, have a hugely negative impact on both NCsoft Europe and its customers," commented Max Brown, NCsoft Europe's Sales & Operations Director. "They seriously affect the player's experience of our products and rob the company of potential revenue that is used to further enhance the player experience on official servers. NCsoft's loss in revenue from e-GLOBAL's operation is estimated in excess of six million Euros. We are defiant in our resolve to stamp out theft of NCsoft's intellectual properties and are prepared to take the strongest measures to do so."
e-GLOBAL was the company's first success in the war against the servers - NCsoft sued the Internet cafe chain and following the suit four of its cafes were raided and illegal software was seized. Also, the company worked close with the FBI in 2006 to shut down an unofficial Lineage server, L2Extreme.com. So, having all these in mind, one thing's certain: official servers are legal and the only places where you don't risk losing your characters. So play safe!