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    APB Reloaded

    Game » consists of 8 releases. Released Jun 29, 2010

    Better known as the free-to-play "APB: Reloaded", APB is a MMO third-person shooter by the developers of Crackdown. Players choose between the hard-boiled law enforcers or the feared criminals as they try to stop the opposing faction's objectives.

    K2 Network Reportedly Buys APB

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    BradNicholson

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    Edited By BradNicholson

    It appears as if someone in the loop is indeed controlling the APB patcher. GI.biz is reporting via sources that K2 Network has purchased the game for around 2.4 million bucks. The report also says that its possible that K2 Network will get APB online and running in some sort of form by the end of the year. The patcher said someone was going to buy the game and possibly get it running.

    K2 Network isn't exactly a name you throw around when discussing video game development, so here's a little intel: according to the studio's Wikipedia page, K2 specializes in bringing free-to-play Asian MMOs to the other markets. It also provides community management and customer services. Some K2 Network joints include Knight Online, War Rock, and 9Dragons. As Joystiq notes, 9Dragons is of special interest to this story because when Acclaim went down, K2 kept the game running. Sounds sorta familiar, right? 
     

    No Caption Provided
      
    None of this is official yet, so do keep that in mind. However, GI.biz appears confident and believes an official announcement from K2 is coming soon. Here's the question, though: are willing to give APB another shot? Or are you more interested in what's going on around the game than the actual game? 
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    BradNicholson

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    #1  Edited By BradNicholson

    It appears as if someone in the loop is indeed controlling the APB patcher. GI.biz is reporting via sources that K2 Network has purchased the game for around 2.4 million bucks. The report also says that its possible that K2 Network will get APB online and running in some sort of form by the end of the year. The patcher said someone was going to buy the game and possibly get it running.

    K2 Network isn't exactly a name you throw around when discussing video game development, so here's a little intel: according to the studio's Wikipedia page, K2 specializes in bringing free-to-play Asian MMOs to the other markets. It also provides community management and customer services. Some K2 Network joints include Knight Online, War Rock, and 9Dragons. As Joystiq notes, 9Dragons is of special interest to this story because when Acclaim went down, K2 kept the game running. Sounds sorta familiar, right? 
     

    No Caption Provided
      
    None of this is official yet, so do keep that in mind. However, GI.biz appears confident and believes an official announcement from K2 is coming soon. Here's the question, though: are willing to give APB another shot? Or are you more interested in what's going on around the game than the actual game? 
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    yoshimitz707

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    #2  Edited By yoshimitz707

    Interesting.

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    Rattle618

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    #3  Edited By Rattle618

    I might give it a shot... hopefully they wont break it too much.

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    BeardyDuck

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    #4  Edited By BeardyDuck

    Won't this turn EXACTLY into Crimecraft then, considering most of K2 Network's games have micro-transactions?

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    Ghostiet

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    #5  Edited By Ghostiet

    Thupagangsta.

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    BabyChooChoo

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    #6  Edited By BabyChooChoo

    Oh no...

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    cooljammer00

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    #7  Edited By cooljammer00

    Is that photo representative of the actions needed to convince me to care about APB?

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    TheChaos

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    #8  Edited By TheChaos
    @cooljammer00 said:
    " Is that photo representative of the actions needed to convince me to care about APB? "
    lol.
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    posttimeskipsam

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    #9  Edited By posttimeskipsam

    So then APB will be free to play considering all those games listed are F2P with micro transactions.

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    Jayross

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    #10  Edited By Jayross

    So, the game is saved?

    Hooray?

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    finstern

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    #11  Edited By finstern

    Seen a huuuuuuuuuuuuge shelf of these sitting in gamestop waiting to be bought. Hate to be the kid who thinks it looks cool.

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    jeffk38uk

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    #12  Edited By jeffk38uk

    Honestly, it could be good if this game was saved, but given that the fundamental core of the gameplay is press F to do everything, and the shooting aspect isnt body damage based but stat based makes it kinda meh even if it goes f2p or whatever.
     
    Still, will see how this goes if this turns out to be true.

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    gmanzig

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    #13  Edited By gmanzig

    I have a bag full of air, think they will buy that too?

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    joshs

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    #14  Edited By joshs

    Not the worst way to spend $2.4 million, but it's still pretty damn bad.

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    GozerTC

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    #15  Edited By GozerTC

    You know if they leverage the character customization system into other games it might be interesting.  Until then I could care less.  
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    The_Laughing_Man

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    #16  Edited By The_Laughing_Man

    I bet they are just after the character maker. 

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    ruffedgz

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    #17  Edited By ruffedgz
    @cooljammer00 said:
    " Is that photo representative of the actions needed to convince me to care about APB? "
    This quote sums it up nicely :D
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    DukeTogo

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    #18  Edited By DukeTogo

    A free-to-play APB would make me try it out.

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    landon

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    #19  Edited By landon

    I don't think I've seen more effort to keep a mediocre game alive.

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    DougQuaid

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    #20  Edited By DougQuaid

    Man I didn't see this coming.. oh wait, I did.

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    deactivated-649f07b15d7b8

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    @JoshS: Kinda brilliant though if you think about it. Buying an already developed game, which if the people at K2 recognize that it would only take a few big tweaks to make this game a lot better, republish it under a APB 2.0 branding, F2P, and was fun, they've just created and published a game for a small fraction of the cost of what full game development would cost.
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    MrRojan

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    #22  Edited By MrRojan

    The patcher speaks " Jars of urine for all ganstas"

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    #23  Edited By JoelTGM

    are they also going to make the gameplay uncrappy?  and if you want to play a free shooter, EA has their new free battlefield game coming out.

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    Chris2KLee

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    #24  Edited By Chris2KLee

    Wow, 2.4 million for game that cost as much as it did. It's a bargain bin deal if it's true, and if so probably doesn't help any of the ex-Dundee team that is owed money (this would all be for creditors at this point). Even the handful of APB fans out there would probably not be happy, since I imagine the game will be in Korea only, at least for the immediate future.

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    SkipT

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    #25  Edited By SkipT

    My experience with K2 while playing Knight Online quite a bit about 5 years ago was that they failed to moderate their game well and then punished legitimate players for the cheating (item duplication) of others. The duping effectively ruined the in game market, demanding that anything of value be purchased with USD through paypal from other players. K2's mismanagement was the biggest factor in driving me away from playing knight online, which had a pretty impressive PvP system.
     
    I would strongly recommend some research into their customer service today before giving them $.01.

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    MarkWahlberg

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    #26  Edited By MarkWahlberg

    2.4 million. That's million bucks.

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    Ryax

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    #27  Edited By Ryax

    id start playing again if they made it free to play, but im not paying them to let me play a game that has no reason for a fee. micro transactions were fine but paying to actually play the game sucked major dick

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    mrcraggle

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    #28  Edited By mrcraggle

    It's a shame what happened to APB. I was in the beta from October last year until a week before release. What sucked for the game was that the large majority of the gameplay involved doing fetch quests. It's bad enough releasing a buggy game but a boring one didn't help. As I was one of the first testers of the game, I saw how the game radically changed from month to month as RTW released huge patches that were often 4GB in size, sometimes bigger. They were getting great feedback from the community and responding to it well but I think they really just had to get the game out of the door with pressure from EA and investors not seeing a return on a game and just couldn't get it complete before release. 

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    Jedted

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    #29  Edited By Jedted

    I geuss somebody REALLY cares about that game if they're willing to pay over $2M to keep it going. 

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    LordAndrew

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    #30  Edited By LordAndrew

    K2? They still exist?

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    boylie

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    #31  Edited By boylie

    I find The unfolding story interesting.  The game, not so much

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    TheMustacheHero

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    #32  Edited By TheMustacheHero

    So it will be the same thing, sept 10 year old kiddies will play it for free and buy all the good guns and say LOLIPWNU!

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    Mattalorian

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    #33  Edited By Mattalorian

    If they change the pricing scheme to some type of free-to-play model, APB will not only be a technical atrocity, but also a preschool full of 10-year-old kids. Combat Arms anyone?
    APB might survive, but it looks like it's headed in an even deeper downward spiral.

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    Vodun

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    #34  Edited By Vodun

    Nooo! Don't just keep it in its current form! It needs to be reworked! APB had great potential but it was an awful game.

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    RinseWashRepeat

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    #35  Edited By RinseWashRepeat
    @gmanzig:
    Does the bag come WITH the air, or will that be DLC?
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    joshs

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    #36  Edited By joshs
    @drewmaw: Considering the time it would take to reprogram most of the game just to make it fun, it would probably cost more than if they had started from scratch. You also have to consider the possibility of the code being poorly documented by the original developer. The studio was going crazy as it was, with the rush to release the game, it is very likely they did not document anything. If they wanted to change enough of the code to make the game fun to play, they would probably end up spending close to two years trying to figure it all out. 
     
    My guess is they will just strip the systems in place for acquiring new clothing/guns and make them available through micro-transactions. That is most likely all they will do.
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    Yummylee

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    #37  Edited By Yummylee

    I are willing.

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    ithmoliar

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    #38  Edited By ithmoliar

    This is a good thing for all those players who forked out hard earned cash. Hooray!

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    NoookNookNook

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    #39  Edited By NoookNookNook
    @Rattle618: Break it too much? More like hopefully fix the hell out of it, APB was really terrible during beta/launch.   Don't expect much more from this new owner as APB at it's core is kinda broken with weak sauce game play, extremely bad performance from it's engine, which also is plagued by AIM Bot exploits that are common to it's engine.   
     
    They've got a lot of work cut out for them to make this game not suck.  
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    TheOneTrueHasenfeffer

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    Fire sale!!!

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    G0rd0nFr33m4n

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    #41  Edited By G0rd0nFr33m4n

    This may sound lame but I actually want APB to live on and improve, a GTA style MMO game would be awesome.. get it right though. 

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