the realm online is shutting down after 27 yearsannouncing the sudden and unexpected end on the games official website realm worlds llcs jaxson michael and roger revealed that the team has failed to acquire the ip rights to the realm online after their offer was allegedly deemed inadequate effectively terminating the relationship with ip holder norseman games and with it our ability to continue to operate and develop the game the company says it has received little feedback on its bids and was not provided with a counteroffer alleging that llc staff have not been compensated for over a yearrealm worlds is described as an allinone platform designed for ttrpg enthusiasts and originally launched way back in december 1996 the current agreement we have with norseman games gives us no path to acquiring the ip the statement explains this impedes our ability to direct more money into developing content for the game as revenue from the game decreases year over year the effective percentage of revenue that goes to norseman increases making it harder still none of the llc members have been compensated for over a year we had full intention of exploring every possibility to grow the player base but without a way to acquire the ip this isnt a workable arrangementconsequently the team says the game servers and website will officially shutdown at 6pm on june 30 2023 3pm pt 11pm uk time and it will now begin issuing prorataed refunds to subscribers and winding down our operations of the gameif a solution is reached before that deadline however operations will resume and finvarras fortress will be in the exact state that we left it nothing will be lost we will be keeping backups of the work we have done over the last five years including all character data from the finvarras fortress server and everything inprogress that hasnt yet been completed the team added we have immensely enjoyed our last five years together trying to make the realm a better place to play as you all know we are all players ourselves so we will continue to see you around we hope that development on the game continues and the game lives a long and fulfilling life here are our picks of the best card games best board games and the best tabletop rpgs right now