Lineage II
Launched by NCSOFT in Korea in 2003, Lineage II is an online role-playing game known for castle sieges and huge clans; free to play since 2011, it still opens new servers in North America.
Lineage II is a massively multiplayer online role-playing game developed and published by South Korea's NCSOFT. It launched in South Korea on 1 October 2003, in North America on 27 April 2004 and in Europe on 19 November 2004. It follows NCSOFT's 1998 game Lineage, while its story is set roughly 150 years before the first game.
The game has been live for more than twenty years. NCSOFT's North American site still publishes weekly maintenance, event and update notices, and it announced a new server for the game's Live version opening on 15 September 2026.
What is it?
Lineage II takes place in a fantasy world containing the kingdoms of Aden and Elmore. Players choose a race such as human, elf, dark elf, orc or dwarf and progress through fighter, mage or support classes. Built on Unreal Engine 2, it stood out for its 3D visuals at the time.
How is it played?
The foundation is character growth: hunting monsters for experience, collecting and enhancing gear. What set Lineage II apart was competition between players at its centre. Players form clans and alliances, and the strongest groups stage large sieges to capture castles. A clan holding a castle can collect taxes from its region, so the game's political map is drawn by the players themselves.
Platforms and business model
Lineage II runs only on Windows. It used a subscription for many years before moving to free to play in North America in November 2011 with the Goddess of Destruction update. NCSOFT's site offers it free today, with revenue from in-game purchases.
NCSOFT runs several versions side by side: the continuously updated Live, Classic servers close to the original experience, and faster-paced Aden servers.
Turkish language and Turkey
There is no official Turkish version or Turkish voice-over, and NCSOFT has not announced a service aimed at Turkey. The official North American version is in English.
Even so, the name is familiar to Turkey's internet cafรฉ generation of the mid-2000s, when Lineage II was among the most discussed online games alongside Metin2 and Knight Online.
Why was it loved?
Lineage II's appeal came from players genuinely changing the world. Which clan held a castle and who allied with whom defined each server's balance of power, and players, not designers, set that balance. This produced rivalries lasting years and server-wide legends.
The game reached a vast audience in South Korea and helped make NCSOFT one of the world's leading online game companies. The universe later moved to mobile with Lineage 2: Revolution (2016) and Lineage 2M (2019), and NCSOFT's Throne and Liberty (2023) was first announced as a game in the Lineage universe.
A game still opening new servers after twenty-two years raises a question: are they for newcomers, or for veterans who want to start again on equal footing? NCSOFT's new-server announcements seem to speak mostly to the latter.
