Throne and Liberty Publisher Transition: Amazon to NC in Q4 2026

Big structural news for anyone invested in Solisium: Amazon Game Studios is ending its publishing deal for Throne and Liberty in the West, and NC (through its FirstSpark Games subsidiary) takes over live operations in Q4 2026. The game continues, characters persist, and the transition is designed as an annoyance rather than a crisis — but there are real changes to know about, including an update pause for major content.

Note: Verified September 17, 2026 against the official Throne and Liberty news page (“An Update on Throne and Liberty in the West”, Aug 12, 2026), NC’s press release and the MCV/PC Gamer industry coverage. NC takes over in the West near the end of 2026 (Q4).

The Short Version

What Players Actually Do

NC’s “KEY TRANSITION FEATURES” list is refreshingly boring, which is the good outcome:

• Accept the new Terms of Service — that’s the entire player-side action.
• No data migration needed: game data and assets, character progression, inventory items and held Lucent all carry over safely.
• Existing Steam, PlayStation and Xbox accounts keep working — you’re unified alongside PURPLE (NC’s proprietary platform) in a single global service. PURPLE players joining shared environments with you is part of the plan.
• NC / FirstSpark handles customer support going forward; old Amazon support channels retire after the transition window.

Why Amazon Is Dropping Both Its Big MMOs

This isn’t a T&L-specific story — it’s the end of Amazon’s whole gaming-publishing era:

• Amazon also ends its publishing deal for Lost Ark, with Smilegate taking over that game in the West in early 2027 (some data won’t transfer on the Lost Ark side: in-game mail, friends-list memos, group names, guild-member nicknames and chat history are among the data types that won’t make the move).
• By contrast, the Throne and Liberty transition keeps basically everything — FirstSpark is the NC studio that develops the game, so NC is “taking back” what it made.
• MCV quotes FirstSpark CEO Moonyoung Choi framing it as NC moving to direct global publishing: “Taking a more direct role in global publishing makes so much sense for us.”

What To Do Before Q4 (Checklist)

1. Confirm your account emails are current — the ToS re-accept goes to your registered platform account.
2. Screenshot your ToS acceptance date — trivial, but if support disputes arise post-handoff, it’s the timestamp that matters.
3. Don’t stockpile currency for a Nix-scale drop — NC has stated major updates may be held until after the transition. Post-transition content beats a dry November.
4. Lucent purchases proceed as normal — your Lucent carries; the marketplace rules continue. No migration-window crash is planned.
5. If you play on console: the PlayStation and Xbox environments persist — nothing to do there beyond accepting NC’s ToS.

The Bigger Picture

This is one of the more orderly publisher hand-offs in modern MMO history: both parties have framed it as handing the game back to its developer. Compare it to the Lost Ark’s messier changeover — user data on Lost Ark will partially drop (smilegate’s early 2027 takeover). For Throne and Liberty, NC has explicitly promised the “unified global service” concept: all regions and platforms (including PURPLE players) operate on the same infrastructure.

The game itself: launched October 1, 2024 to strong early DAUs across PC/PS5/Xbox, live through the Frozen Divide: Nix expansion (June 25, 2026), and now continues as NC’s in-house western service — the same structure NC runs with AION 2 on Steam.

FAQ

When does Throne and Liberty change publishers? Q4 2026. Amazon announced the transition on August 12, 2026, and NC (via FirstSpark Games) takes over western live operations.

Will my Throne and Liberty characters be deleted? No — all progress, inventory items and held Lucent carry over. You accept NC’s new Terms of Service and continue playing on your existing Steam/PSN/Xbox account.

Is Throne and Liberty shutting down? No — the opposite: the game’s developer (FirstSpark/NC) takes over directly. Amazon’s publishing phase ends; content updates continue, with larger drops held until the transition completes.

Will Throne and Liberty still update after Amazon leaves? Yes — NC takes over live operations directly and regular content updates continue. Major expansions (Nix-class updates) may be paused until after the Q4 hand-off to support data migration.

What happens on Lost Ark? Smilegate takes over western publishing in early 2027 — but note that Lost Ark user data is being partially dropped in the transfer (in-game mail, friends-list memo fields, guild member memos and chat history don’t migrate).