KingsIsle Acquisition and Looking Ahead
My Dear KingsIsle Community,
The beginning of a new year is always a wonderful time, albeit a little too cold for my tastes as a Pyromancer, but as each day gets longer the sun gets brighter, and soon Spring will be here before we know it! Speaking of new beginnings, some of you may have seen the press release about the acquisition of KingsIsle by Gamigo. This is certainly big news, and I wanted to chat about what that means and answer some of the questions that you may have.
First of all, let me assure you that the friendly faces that you’ve come to know and love aren’t changing and we’re full steam ahead on the next updates and laying the foundation for the year to come. Ratbeard and Mattnetic are agonizing over a plethora of spreadsheets and math. The illustrious Jeff Toney is doodling away and you should see some of the astounding things Adam Roush is concepting for the next update! Decius is continuing to curate and maintain our Crown Shop and promotion plan, and you will be able to continue to beg him on twitter for the next Crowns Sale as usual. Sparck/Bat Masterson will be coordinating many KI Lives to come, and Vanessa Mythdust will be continuing to hone her art of the pun. We’re still here, we’re still KingsIsle, and we’re not planning on slowing down.
Gamigo is enthusiastic about the same things we have always been excited about at KingsIsle. First and foremost, we have the best community out there. Period. We’ve discussed how helpful and positive y’all are, they’re quite impressed! Second, it’s a very rare and precious thing for an MMO game to be thriving as it approaches it’s teenage years, which is certainly in part because of you – our amazing community. Gamigo is excited to become a part of such a wonderous phenomenon. In 2020’s Producer’s letters, I spoke in length about gearing Wizard101 up for the next decade with various overhauls and revamps. Gamigo and the team have talked about the long view, how we’re in this to keep the game thriving through the next ten anniversaries and beyond, and we both endeavor to make that happen. We’re committed to keeping the updates flowing, and… there may be some exciting opportunities outside of what you’ve come to expect. Stay tuned.
[Previous event offer mentioned here has expired]
Continue to have fun, be the amazing community you already are, and keep your eyes peeled as we’ll soon be able to start talking about the next update as we get closer to that Test Realm date!
January 22, 2021 Update:
Hi KI Community! I wanted to follow up with a quick note on some of the things buzzing around since the acquisition.
First of all, there are no plans for Wizard101 or Pirate101 to go entirely Free to Play because of this. We’re sticking with our current model for the foreseeable future.
Second, I’ve talked at length how proud I am to be part of a community that has grown up with us. Our target demographic when we first launched in 2008 was tweens and teens, Pirate skewing a touch older in 2012, but not much. We happily found that folks older and younger loved our games as well. A growing amount of you that have been with us for the long haul are no longer in that age range, but one thing our MMOs were built on was to be a safe and inclusive online space for all ages. That is not changing. Our very identity is that we are a family friendly game for everyone, the kind of game that kids and parents can play together.
Lastly, we’re INCREDIBLY excited for those “exciting opportunities” I mentioned, but there’s nothing I can announce right now. First and foremost, we’re getting the KI team integrated with our friends at Gamigo, while our update schedule remains exactly as planned a week ago. From there, we’ll start working on translating some of our other ideas to actual working plans.
One of those ideas is to have more regular updates to Pirate101. I’m excited about the possibilities but this is something that will take some planning and coordination with Gamigo (and, frankly, more developers than we have now) to make happen.
These things take time, so please be patient with us, and stay tuned. We’ll talk more about this on KI Live, and through the coming months as progress progresses!
See you in the Spiral,
Leah “Professor Falmea” Ruben
Lead Producer of MMO Content
KingsIsle Blog 
With the buyout, will Pirates be seeing any updates in the future or not?
i guess so , because the new company will be ditching all the mobile games and focusing on the 2 main games wiz and pirate
Anything for Pirate 101? Just hear Wizard 101 in your comment except for booster pack.
Not one mention of Pirate by the MMO Developer, but it was mentioned in the Press Release. Who should I believe?
Hello, is there any update coming for w101 derby anytime soon? (please) xD
Pirate101, its a good game that got ignored, anything on this?
Hi! Please visit either Wizard101.com or Pirate101.com and login to your account. Once logged in, you will see more options in the Account section in the upper left of your screen. Click on ‘Redeem Card or Code’ and enter in the code there.
How do you enter the code?
I was wandering if pvp is going to get any better? As I have on several occasions sat in que for several hours its like you can’t get in and that’s the ranked pvp the tournament is worse every time I que for a tournament it keeps telling me Diego couldn’t put me in a bracket I’m using an over lvl 80 pyromancer also it’s like no one ever seems to want to do pet derby stuff anymore I have not been able to get in on one ever since I started playing a year ago it’s like no one wants to do pet derby or anything any more maybe if we get rid of beast moon and such people would go back to being able to do pvp and pet derby stuff?
Hey, since mobile games are getting cut out, maybe you can just tell us what you had planned for the plot of Animal Cove?
hi, loved this game since the beginning and still loving it. Here’s hoping only better things to come!! the only thing i got for negative is upping the drop rate a little more for mounts and pets and less treasure cards, cause my bag fills up fast and have to delete TC’s. Keep up the great job!!
I have just seen an enemy that is level 79 while our characters can only reach level 70 what give
Yeah, what about Pirate101?!
So excited to hear about this! More Pirate101 content please!
As if this was written by a Pyromancer. If this were written by a Pyromancer as a dev they’d stop getting NERFED.
Been playing this game since the very beginning. I’d be telling a lie if I said this does not make me nervous. Hoping for good things though!
Very nervous!
me as well. have the game from way back when they use to advertise it on tv. sure is crazy. im nervous about the changes and buy out..
Update pirate101 we need new content
Regarding Pirate101’s more frequent updates: can we expect new worlds, and new full arc stories again – like before? Like Wizard101?
Understandable that the games would not go entirely free to play, but is there any chance that we free players could gain access to Firecat Alley and Cyclops Lane?
I am a very elderly senior, will be 85 and I play daily most of the time. I started Wizard 101 in 2012 after 3 of my real life friends started, we would get together at each others house to play one day a week to quest together. I have since moved to another state and we still play one day a week questing together. We have not as yet been able to do complete the last fight in Empyrea. Wizard has helped me filled a lot of happy hours. Thanks for the game.
basically just do 30,000 damage in 3 hits over 3 rounds to beat it after that he will die the best and easy way is to have 1 jade (first player all resist/healer) 2 support players (blading the fire wazard cause they have access to really high damage over time) 1 fire wizard saving pips and blading for a max pip heckhound and as long as you do 30,000 damage you will beat it no spoilers though cause its a cool storyline.
Wizard101 and Pirate101 mean so much to me. I’ve been playing Wizard101 since I was 9 years old and I’m about to turn 19 in a couple of months. I hope Gamigo does a great job in taking care of these games.
Disappointed to hear that the game isn’t going free to play at least maybe the first full world as I feel like there isn’t long enough free-to-play time to get a player really engaged in the games world and combat.
I’ve got a number of friends that would try it but they don’t want to pay quite as early as I’ve had to say the paywalls kick in.
I understand maybe the full game can’t go free to play and that’s fine but is it really to much to ask for all of wizard city and maybe part of krokotopia to be F2P? With how many world’s there are in this game now I can’t really see it making that big of a difference.
I’m really hoping that the free-to-play part of the game could be extended to level 50 or even 60 (seeing as though the game has MUCH evolved since the release when the cap was 50). Having the pay wall be at 50 would allow new players to get an actual feel for the game and it’s mechanics, because Wizard City is so incredibly easy that new players can’t even get a grasp of what the game actually feels like. Even if the pay wall is at the start of MarleyBone or Mooshu, new players need this additional experience before they get hit with a $10 payment (IMO).
I hope the “Earn Crowns” by watching videos option continues for us free players. I have never bought crowns or memberships. If the “Earn Crowns” option goes away I will have to stop playing.
So excited to hear about new content coming to Pirate 101!
I wasn’t able to play this game as much as I have wanted to due to the subscription when I was younger but now that has changed. I can’t wait to join such an amazing game and community, I’m also super grateful to see just how active the devs are with the game still to this date. Thank you.
Hi, I started playing KingsIsle back in 05 or 06. I really loved Pirate101. Its been years sense I was on. I heard about the buy out. I can’t wait to see what updates that will come. I downloaded the game again.
Not to be that person but I have suggestions. Now that I make money and have a good bit. I hope you will listen.
1. I like Marleybone Ships. So could you make it so I can transfer stats from one ship to another.
2. Can you make more houses. Also could we buy more space to put things in houses.
3. I had an idea for custom clothing in game, (not like stats.) I mean IRL 18th century clothing had nice patterns and floral designs. Could you like scan some pattern in game, and let us use them on a blank piece of clothing. As a form of art project for self expression.
I mean, a nice crown shop pattern would be a good way to make money $$$ and rare colors or base designs.
4. Please update some rare companions from crown shop giving them some upgrades.
5. Add a in game pocket watch that I can set to my time. Its a little thing, but there is no way in game to tell what time it is without quitting the game. Also if I could set a timer for say 3 hours that would be great. If this Item was in the crown shop for 3000 crowns I would buy it. just saying.
Last my cousin just had a baby, so when she grow a little this could be a second generation game. So look forward to what you will do
thanks Evan
sounds great very euphoric to read as someone who grew up playing these games wizard101 to be exact i would love to see wizard 101 get the recognition it deserves please treat the game well its a hidden gem, with the right care i feel as if it could be up there with huge games like genshin or even call of duty
I have a question can you guys add a more useful way for pets in combat and arena and maybe make pets as quest rewards because there are little ways to get them besides farming and buying packs same goes to mounts
My daughter is soooo excited! She is 16 this year and has been playing Pirates since inception! She is high functioning autistic and this game has been her go to! She was upset that there hadn’t been any story updates on Pirates. Anyway, she came to me first thing this morning to tell me that she had found out there will be updates and she awaits them with baited breath!
Chelrie of the Fowler Pirate Clan!
is wizard city free to play yet in 2022 like the first sections of the place?