Latest Neocron News and Information

It's been just over a week since the shock news of Reakktor's second insolvency broke.

Since then there has been a flurry of acitivity on the offical forums. The first major bit of activity was Kirk Lenke finally posting answers to the questions we all asked months ago about Neocron.

In other news the community has been really backing and supporting KK in this difficult time. A new GM called Jord has just started on the GM team, and he did take time to post on the forums. Also the community welcomed back 2 very well known and respected members of Reakktor, Nidhogg and Hoder.

Also for once there has been a bit of in-game forums posts for a change. First of was from a certain member of the THN who finally leveled his APU monk to INT 100 , and a Gold WoC3 PA party was held in Plaza 1.

Overall the community response and reaction to the insolvency news has been very positive in supporting Reakktor, and it's clear none of the community want to see Neocron go.

So to Reakktor and everyone, keep the faith. Everyone at the THN and everyone in the Neocron community is behind you.

You may remember a while back we reported the community's bid to get some new solid information on Neocron, it's status and it's future. Today we have that information.

Late last night Reakktor Media's CEO Kirk Lenke returned to the official forums to deliver answers to almost every question asked in the campaign for information last year. What makes this response so important is the brutal honesty it is delivered with. There is far to much to quote here so we advise you head straight over to the official forums to read Kirk's response . There is also a separate discussion thread found here .

The most poiniant and imporant answer we found across the two posts, is Kirk's complete commitment to Neocron and the news of exactly how the Neocron server's have stayed online so long while the account fee has been turned off.  

"The only action I could take was putting the payments off and keeping Neocron alive somehow without causing any costs for Reakktor, the fund or Gamigo. The servers in the past years have been paid by me and I mean by me."
- Kirk Lenke, Reakktor Media CEO.

For the second time in 4 years, Reakktor's CEO Kirk Lenke has delivered news to the community that Reakktor Media are faced with insolvency. Back in 2008 Reakktor were faced with this tough situation as a result of the catastrophic collapse of their - at the time - parent company and publisher 10tacel Studios AG.

While details are currently thin on the ground, Kirk has stated he will deliver more news in the week to come. Regarding the existence of Neocron, Kirk has reassured the community that the game will survive for the time being in its current state. Also, an ever up-beat Kirk commented that the business still has the intention to develop Neocron 3. Of course we shall have to wait and see what the future holds.

Everyone at the Tech Haven Network sends their thoughts and best wishes to the staff and volunteers at Reakktor Media.

Reakktor Media's insolvency was declared on Wednesday 15th February 2012 and announced to the Neocron community late on Saturday 18th February. You can find Kirk Lenke's first post here, followed by a second post thanking the community for support.

It's a been a few weeks since Kirk Lenke responded to the community on the subject of Neocron 2. So here is what's been happening on the Dear KK (Kirk) thread.

So hear is a brief summary on the whole story so far.

Loki on the 16th August 2011 opened the thread with this open letter. Many members of the community posted in that thread expressing their opinion and anger towards Reakktor. Danae was one of the first people from Reakktor to respond. She also posted up a very useful new thread on Neocron Account Issues and also Forum Account Issues .

Then on the 29th August 2011 Kirk Lenke made his first response to the thread, and he acknowledged some of the issues that is affecting Neocron 2.

On the 2nd of September Loki and Kirk Lenke had a telephone call, discussing the issues of Neocron 2, and Loki did release most of the details of that call to the community. Kirk Lenke did also clarify a issue on the developers working on Neocron. It turns out, that the devs are currently contracted to work on Black Prophecy and any time they spend on Neocron 2 has to be done in their own time .

As the thread had got quite long, he asked for a little helping in collating the questions together to make life a little easier for him. (And also everyone else!) The questions on the thread for Kirk was collated into one post. This was on the 8th September 2011 and he was expecting to give some answers by around the 15th September.

The thread went a little quiet, and Kirk wasn't able to respond due to be away in the USA on a business trip.

Kirk now appears to be back home, and he did post a short message to say on the 4th October "I do still have the answers in my agenda. BUT.... It will take some time - sorry."

So to sum up, Kirk is working on the great list of questions that everyone has asked. What isn't clarified is how long the answers will be. Personally I hope no longer than a week, however as soon as Kirk posts any news up, myself and everyone at the THN will pass on the news as quickly as possible.

Update: 16:15 Krik Lenke posted another update. No answers to the questions, but he does slightly outline how he plans to address the issues with Neocron.

"I can also understand that some may be dissapointed.
But I haven't forgotten it and I will try to answer it as soon as I have the time to answer it in a proper way with honest estimates and honest answers.

It would help nobody I guess, if I rush through it and promise a pot of gold at the end of a rainbow and then you find a burning oil drum. But this may is a bad example as well, cause some like them...

Take care and I will return as soon as I can"

We look forward to honest answers and estimates to the questions that everyone is asking about Neocron 2.

Another post update, not from ReaKKtor, but community member LOKI , who has this week been making efforts to get some answers on the state of Neocron.

It doesn't answer all the questions that the community has been asking, however Kirk is planning to repond to the thread next week.

Here is what LOKI posted to the forums.

"I just got off the phone after a 20 minute conversation with Kirk Lenke. On reading my post, and a couple of the PM's I have sent him over the months, he asked for a contact number to call me on.

In the 20 minutes we had on the phone, we discussed a lot about Neocron, its current state and its future. Kirk went into a lot of detail about certain things that I'm not sure I can discuss here, so I'll share with you the basics of what he specifically said I could talk about.

Pretty much the first point that came up was IP (Intellectual Property). I don't think I am over-stepping the line in saying this, as I'm pretty sure this is information that could be obtained from various Google searches/phone calls. Neocron is the IP of ReaKKtor Media, and Black Prophecy is the IP of Gamigo. So... what does that mean?

Essentially, it means that the team at KK are paid to work on BP, and only BP. They are not paid to work on Neocron. As such, the (failed) 174 patch of over a year ago was worked on by their developers in their FREE TIME. This is a big deal, and is something I wasn't entirely aware of prior to our phone call. This isn't the only issue though.

Kirk also confirmed what we already knew. The code is old, haggered and an utter nightmare to work with.

On a plus note, however, work is currently underway on re-developing the anti-cheat patch which failed many months ago; again, in their free time. Kirk did give me a rough ETA, but I can't share that. If he feels it's a date they can stick to, then I'm sure he will share it when he responds to this thread.

Kirk seemed like a nice bloke, and it seems I may have misjudged him based only on his lack of presence on this forum. It was clear to me on that phone call that Kirk is genuine when he says he cares about Neocron, and is proud of what the game achieved many years ahead of its time. I believe him when he says he is working on kick starting the development of Neocron 3, but for the reasons outlined above, there's a lot more to it than just taking 'some' of the team off Black Prophecy. Sadly, it's never going to be that simple.

Kirk was honest with me about everything I asked. Nothing was ignored or brushed away. Again, I wish I could share the entirety of our conversation, but some of what Kirk said is better left for him to share himself.

He said he'd take the time to read and reply to this at some point next week, and he's aware the timer is still ticking ;)"

Well after the threads on the Neocron Forums and the Black Prophecy Forums about the lack of communication and news on Neocron, we are pleased to report Kirk Lenke has replied in at least 2 different threads on the Neocron forums.

Here is main reply. 

"Promise!

I will go through this thread within the next days and answer some of your questions and get back to you into a proper discussion!

All the best and thanks for caring about the game you seem to love (still)

Kirk"

Although, nothing on patches or anything related to the game, it's the first official response we have seen in a long time from anyone in KK and is a good start in the right direction to hopefully addressing the issues of Neocron in the next few days.

We at the THN and the Neocron Community will be watching the Neocron forums quite closely over the next few days.

There isn't alway much news about Neocron, but a thread on the official forums has caught our attention.

LOKI who has been a long player of Neocron for a long time has posted a thread on the offiical forums to express his disappointment on the lack of updates and communication to the community .

It's a view that the THN shares, whether we are an official fansite or not. The lack of any communications from ReaKKtor cannot continue like this. If ReaKKtor do decide to post any news, we shall let you know.

We don't normally post news from Black Prophecy, but this press release from Gamigo has caught our attention.

The short version is Gamigo have brought a 19.9% stake in Reakktor.

The longer version is in the press release below, which you can discuss on the Official Neocron Forums. It isn't clear what, if any, what effect it will have on Neocron.

"Hamburg, January 27, 2011 – gamigo, one of the leading publishers of free-to-play online computer games in Europe and North America, is increasing its stake in the space action MMOG "Black Prophecy". Today gamigo announced that they have acquired all trademarks and copyrights associated with "Black Prophecy" as well as a 19.9% stake in the developer studio Reakktor Media GmbH from AAA Capital Game Production and Sales GmbH & Co. Fonds Nr. 2 KG. The remaining shares to Reakktor Media GmbH are held by its CEO, Kirk Lenke.

Patrick Streppel, Executive Board Member at gamigo, said this: "Investing in "Black Prophecy" and Reakktor Media GmbH is a forward-looking step for gamigo. "Black Prophecy" is the biggest project our company has worked on so far and is also an example of the high quality of games produced in Germany, completely unique in its market segment."

Rainer Markussen, Executive Board Member at gamigo, said this: "With the completion of closed beta testing and the award for "Best of gamescom (free to play)" last year, I'm really looking forward to seeing "Black Prophecy" go live in the very near future. With that step, gamigo will be cementing its position as one of the leading publishers and producers of premium online games that are marketed and licensed around the globe."

"Working even more closely together will give us more opportunity to trade know-how and will allow us to drive expansions of "Black Prophecy" and new high-quality games forward together," said Kirk Lenke, CEO of Reakktor Media."

Currently neocron.com and forum.neocron.com are not available, due to the domain name expiring, which probably means someone at Reakktor forgot to pay for the annual renewal of the domain!

No ETA for when it will be back, and I don’t know at this time if this effects the game servers. In the mean time, if you want to talk about Neocron, feel free to use the THN forums.

Update, 13:52 GMT:

The game servers appear to be online.

Update: 15:32 GMT:

Looks like the domain is back. In some cases, depending on your ISP, it may take anything from a few hours to a few days before you can connect to the websites again.