A first person shooter MMO that launched in June 2010 and then shut down, along with its developer, just a few months later, is close to coming back from the dead. APB Reloaded"s developer GamersFirst has announced on the game"s official blog site that the open beta test for the game will begin on May 18.
While that is the official date, the truth is that if you want to play the game earlier you have a good chance of doing so. The blog update reveals that if you sign up for a free GamersFirst account and then submit your email info on the newsletter email signup form located on the main APB Reloaded web site, you will likely be able to get into the game sometime before the official open beta date. In fact the blog site admits that today it will invite a whopping 40,000 more people into the game"s current closed beta test.
The blog site also goes over other topics including word that the character restoration system for old characters will go into effect sometime today. Also GamersFirst plans to start kicking out cheaters and hackers from the game, saying, "We have ON PURPOSE not kicked hackers for over a week to monitor what they are doing. That clearly will change."
The original APB (All Points Bulletin) was developed by Realtime Worlds as a subscription-based MMO for several years. It finally launched in June 2010 but the game suffered from numerous technical issues and bugs. As a result the player population did not grow as anticipated. A few months later the game"s servers shut down and Realtime Worlds itself closed its doors, leaving hundreds of people in both Scotland and the US to seek work. Late in 2010, K2 Network and its subsidiary GamersFirst obtained the rights and content to APB and decided to relaunch it as a free-to-play game.