MAY 7, 2009 • South Korean publisher HanbitSoft has restarted development on Mythos, a dungeon-themed MMO that was a casualty in the demise of Flagship Studios in 2008. HanbitSoft retained the IP rights, and new development on the MMO is being carried out by the publisher’s parent, T3 Entertainment, and Redbana U.S.

Impact: Flagship Studios was a company founded by a group of ex-Blizzard Entertainment employees that had worked on Diablo. In 2007, the company launched the high profile failure, Hellgate: London MMO. The failure of Hellgate resulted in the collapse of Flagship and HanbitSoft picked up the rights to Mythos. In the high risk world of MMOs, there is always the question of whether product in development has any value with the collapse of the development team. HanbitSoft is clearly trying to salvage work done on Mythos and this will be an interesting case study to watch.