Do you remember Camelot Unchained? The spiritual successor to the old MMO “Dark Age of Camelot,” it grossed more than $2.2 million in a barely successful 2013 Kickstarter campaign, but then fell far behind schedule due to alpha and beta testing and essentially disappeared from the map completely. The last time we heard about it was in 2020, when developer City State Entertainment managed to irritate backers by announcing plans for a new, entirely separate online game ahead of the one they were supposed to be developing , was even close to being finished.
But now it seems like things are finally coming together. In a press release (via Massive surgery), the studio – now known as Unchained Entertainment– said that the second online game, Final Stand: Ragnarok, will now be the first as it is set to launch into Early Access in March (more on that later), while Camelot Unchained is expected to finally release sometime in late 2025.
The focus of the press release is actually on the Unchained Engine, which, according to Unchained President and CEO Mark Jacobs, “is a dream that I have been obsessed with for more than 30 years.”
“Our engine delivers massive battles similar to those in major Hollywood productions like The Lord of the Rings to video games where thousands of real players interact and share an epic experience in real time,” said Jacobs. “We’re excited to bring our own games to market and share our technology with other dreamers in the not-too-distant future.”
Unchained and its related games have gained popularity thanks to investments from sources such as: B. “gained speed”. A16Z Games, a venture capital firm co-founded by Netscape founder Marc Andreessen. With the infusion of an unspecified amount of money, Unchained Entertainment is “increasing its financing, hiring and publishing efforts for the release of Unchained Engine, Final Stand: Ragnarok and the long-awaited open-world MMORPG Camelot Unchained.”
It's interesting that Unchained seems to have Unreal-like ambitions when it comes to its game engine. The field is already dominated by heavyweights like Unity and Unreal Engine, with various proprietary engines filling in the gaps, and I find it hard to imagine that the Unchained Engine will be able to find a place beyond Unchained's own games, if so They don't really do anything particularly.
And it may be – but the first game to use it, Last Stand: Ragnarok, hasn't exactly caused much of a stir so far. It has been in Early Access on Steam since October 2021 and has so far only received six user reviews and a peak number of 32 concurrent players. That's obviously more a reflection of the game than the underlying technology, but still it suggests that it's not doing something that will immediately grab attention.
There's also some confusion surrounding today's announcement: Final Stand: Ragnarok is already in Early Access. So what exactly will happen in March – a “relaunch”, a 1.0 version that was worded incorrectly in the announcement, or something else entirely – is not clear. I've reached out to Unchained for clarification and will update if I receive a response.
Even more interesting, however, is the announced release target for Camelot Unchained. It's equal parts distant and vague, so it's hard to call it set in stone, and the reaction continues Reddit is largely dismissive: the reaction seems largely split between disbelief that it will actually happen and expectation that it won't be good when it does happen. Personally, I have no idea how it will turn out, but after so much time, money and disappointment, I'm really excited to see how it turns out.
