There is a writer that really loves us out there. Which we are rather glad about. He is also getting rather well known. So when I phoned Eurogamer to say "you know you have nothing about Wurm on your site," I got two replies. One was, "Never heard of you," which was a little disconcerting, and the other was "but we know this writer called Quintin .." Well, funny you should say that, I thought.

To cut a long story to a sensible length (which basically means I should shut up) you can read the resulting article by clicking here. And maybe some of the other Eurogamer people can come and play for themselves, and very welcome they will be too!

After weeks of design, discussion and late night dinners, Wurm Online has launched a brand new server - Independence, The Freedom Isles.

Far in the southern hemisphere of Wurm, past the blue mountains of the dreaded Circle Sea, lay the Freedom Isles; a long sought after refuge from war and want, from raids and the ravages of time, these lands offer a place of peace and adventure. The first of these lands has been named Independence, to reflect that the early refugees are seeking their freedom from the Kingdoms of Mol Rehan, Jenn Kellon and the Horde of the Summoned. These lands will be strictly non-pvp and will be continually developed to reduce griefing and harassment while still allowing the citizens the widest possible opportunity to build, create, terraform the world and develop a whole new society.

This land is very different from previous lands. Though it shares some of the mountainous feel of the Mol Rehan home lands, it also boasts mighty forests and Fjords, vast plains and steppes and a high altitude, lost world, ripe for the taking. This will be an adventure for all, experienced or new from Golden Valley, our starter server.

First Footing

Players who take ship from the Kingdoms arrive at the north of the land. They may wish to make for the massive Fjord, a little to the East of a tall mountain, where they will find the small, underdeveloped area where players using the portals arrive.There are no plans to develop the starter town since it is coastal. It has just two small shacks and the beginnings of a grand highway, apparently abandoned.

You will probably want to scout out a more inland position for a central trading town that is more accessible to the whole map, rather than the gods choose it for you. You can then decide between you how large it should be, who runs it, how you all pay for the upkeep and so on. It is entirely up to you. Then you can build a spectacular highway from the starter town to your new capital...

The New Look

As you will have already found out, Wurm has massively upgraded its look. Kinoss has spent days reworking all the tile textures, upgrading them to a larger size and taking into account some comments over the years that the Beta servers had a warmer feel to them. For those of you with faster graphics and running Wurm with everything on "eleven," the tiles are now far more detailed, giving a hint more realism to the game. Mortimar has also been working on new walls and fences - the fences are the first to arrive.

Following hard on the heals of this update will be a tree update - you will see some of those in the screen shots of the new server. They are not completely finished yet, so stand by for those!

And of course, the Freedom game has a brand new look for its citizens. This more rural look reflects the mature, laid back nature of life on Independence, and the other lands of the Freedom Isles as they arrive.

A New Micro Site

As with the other Kingdoms, Freedom has its own micro website for news and information. It is mostly blank for the moment, but we at the massive web department of Wurm Online, are waiting, pens poised, for news to come flooding in from the players as they make their new homes in this wonderful new world. Find the site here,

What Next?

Well, the countdown to the closing of the two original home servers has begun, and very soon the focus will turn to the players migrating to the Wild server where the Kingdoms are pitted against each other.

Meanwhile, development has started on the new Epic server; a land of challenges and stories where PvP will be very much required! And there will also be more changes to Golden Valley to make that a better place to find your feet before meeting the challenges that the Premium

But for the moment, it is the time of Freedom and the people who are on their way to Independence. Braving the seas by ship, taking the God's portals from the old lands and from the Portal Steppe on Golden Valley.

Wurm Online

Two Lives - One Game