ArcheAge and ArcheAge: Unchained will soon merge into one experience, Kakao Games has announced. This comes following changes and the company admitting that the ArcheAge: Unchained population was too low to continue to run it as-is.
When Kakao has big decisions to make, they've often sought input from the community. This time was no different, and in admitting that they could not let ArcheAge: Unchained keep running with a low population, they asked players if merging the two would be something that the community would support. The answer was yes, and the merge will begin on November 30th.
The team has released some of the info about what to expect from the merge, the servers afterwards, and some of the other details about all of your personal items, your characters, guild info, houses, rankings, Auction House and more.
The list of changes and how they will handle everyone's accounts, from subscriptions to login records to credits to sales and possessions, is a very long list. If you have characters in either game, it's worth looking to see exactly what's going to happen. Kakao Games has made it so that it looks like most of the time, if there’s a choice to be made between character records that the highest of a particular item or stat will remain.
As for the servers, there will be one big merged server left in North America and Europe. This means a lot of data is getting moved around.
One of the changes that the team made not long ago was to turn ArcheAge: Unchained into a game where a subscription was mandatory, and limited free accounts. With the merge, if you have an active ArcheAge: Unchained subscription, any remaining time on your sub will be transferred to Patron time in the new merged game at a 1:1 ratio.
Some data will be lost, like dungeon stats, UI settings, and pending friend requests, but it looks like they're aiming to maintain a lot of things. Most of the family data will also remain, as well as guild data.
When it comes to housing, this is where it will likely be frustrating for some. Installed houses are going to be redistributed as kits when the merge happens. Any furniture will be sent in the mail. Starting over is going to be a reality, but with a stronger population in the merged game, it seems like there will be many doing just that.
