Ncsoft

NCSOFT Corporation
엔씨소프트

Type	Public company
Traded as	KRX: 036570
Industry	Computer and video games Interactive entertainment
Founded	March 11, 1997
Headquarters	Seoul, South Korea[1] Subsidiary Companies Seattle, Washington, USA Osaka, Japan New Taipei, Taiwan Shanghai, China Brighton, England Austin, Texas, USA Orange County, California, USA Bangkok, Thailand
Key people	T.J. Kim, CEO
Products	Aion Blade & Soul Guild Wars Guild Wars 2 Lineage Lineage II WildStar
Revenue	US$ 686.6 million (2012)[2]
Operating income	US$ 137.0 million (2012)[2]
Net income	US$ 142.0 million (2012)[2]
Total assets	US$ 1.2 billion (2012)[2]
Total equity	US$ 922.9 million (2012)[2]
Number of employees	~3,000
Website	http://www.ncsoft.net/

T.J. Kim, the CEO of NCSOFT

NCSOFT is a South Korea-based online, video and mobile game development company that has produced Lineage, City of Heroes, WildStar, Guild Wars and Aion.

History

NCSOFT was founded in March 1997 by T.J. Kim. In September 1998, NCSOFT launched its first game Lineage.

In April 2001 the company created a US subsidiary under the name NC Interactive (based in Austin, Texas, and would later become NCSOFT West.) after acquiring Destination Games, headed by Richard Garriott and Robert Garriott. In 2004, NCSOFT launched two MMORPGs, Lineage II and City of Heroes.^[3]

The company formed NCSOFT Europe in July 2004 as a wholly owned subsidiary with its main office in Brighton, England. They brought City of Heroes to several European countries on February 4, 2005, and established Lineage II service for Europe as well.

On April 26, 2005, the company launched Guild Wars, a MMORPG with no subscription model. Expansions followed: Guild Wars Factions, Guild Wars Nightfall and Guild Wars Eye of the North. On April 24, 2009, NCSOFT announced that Guild Wars had sold more than six million units.^[4] On August 28, 2012, NCSOFT launched Guild Wars 2.

On September 10, 2008, NCSOFT announced the formation of NCSOFT West, a subsidiary which manages NCSOFT's other western organizations, and established its headquarters for that subsidiary in Seattle, Washington.^[5]

On July 8, 2011, NCSOFT started talks with SK Telecom to acquire Ntreev Soft Co., Ltd.^[6] The talks were expected to last less than a month, but it took seven for NCSOFT to complete the acquisition; purchasing 76% of Ntreev's stock for ₩108 billion (US$96.7 million) on February 15, 2012.^[7]

In 2011, NCSOFT purchased Hotdog Studio, a mobile game studio based in Seoul that produces phone and smartphone titles such as Dark Shrine.^[8]

On June, 2012, NCSOFT launched Blade & Soul, the next MMORPG after AION, in 2006. NCSOFT has shown the next MMORPG before 2 weeks in Project[M] name and released Blade & Soul in NCSOFT Media Day in Korea.

In 2012 Nexon acquired a 14.7 percent interest in NCSOFT for $688 million.^[9]

In November, 2012, NCSOFT closed down City of Heroes.

Customer satisfaction

NCSOFT and RightNow Technologies were both recognized in 2006 with the "Beagle Research 'Whiz Kids' Award for Innovative Embedded Customer Service Solution."^[10] for NCSOFT's integration of RightNow's customer support software.

Games

Under Development

Available

End of Life / Closed

Titles not available in English

In addition, NCSOFT is also the developer and maintainer of a variety of web-based board games in Asian markets.

Controversy

Stolen source code

On April 27, 2007, Seoul Metropolitan Police said that seven former employees of NCSOFT are suspected of selling the Lineage III source code to a major Japanese game company.^[11] According to NCSOFT, the potential damages may exceed US$1 billion.^[12]

Worlds.com patent lawsuit

Worlds.com CEO

• NCSOFT
• NCSOFT West

External links

References

On August 31, 2012, NCSOFT liquidated Paragon Studios and announced the closure of City of Heroes. Over 21,000 players signed an online petition contesting the shut-down^[18] and many used social media to promote their criticisms.

Closure of Paragon Studios and City of Heroes

^[17].US$32 million, bringing the total damages awarded to Garriott to US$4 million Garriott again prevailed on appeal and NCSOFT was required to pay an additional ^[16] in damages. NCSOFT appealed the ruling.US$28 million federal court awarded him Texas On July 30, 2010, a jury in a [15]

Richard Garriott termination

On April 23, 2010, the Worlds.com case settled, but the terms of the settlement were kept confidential. On July 22, 2010, Worlds.com requested the case be reopened. ^[13] in what he says will be the first of many lawsuits against MMO developers.^[14] and targeted NCSOFT for patent infringement in 2008,[13]