Asheron's Call 2: Fallen Kings Returns From the Ashes

In what has to be the most unexpected and yet welcome news we've seen all year, Turbine has announced that Asheron's Call 2: Fallen Kings (and one would assume its Legions expansion pack) has been resurrected on a lone server called Dawnsong. An active subscription to the original Asheron's Call is required to log in to it, but it's still very a very nice boon for those players who have sorely missed the MMORPG sequel since it was shuttered at the end of 2005:
Greetings!

Asheron's Call 2 has returned! We have opened up a new server for anyone who has an active Asheron's Call subscription to play Asheron's Call 2 for free! Although we would have loved to revisit some of our old characters with you, we were not able to bring over any of your old characters. We do, however, present this new Asheron's Call 2 server, Dawnsong, to all active Asheron's Call players with a paid subscription or who purchase an ACTD retail key and subscribe.

What does this mean to you?

Below is a link to the Asheron's Call 2 client installer so you may get the game up and running. This will provide access to the new Dawnsong server. Although the server has passed our initial tests, we have a lot of monitoring and tweaking to do to the game environment and we want to ensure that our players understand that. This game service will be provided as a beta for all players with an active Asheron's Call account. That said, the game server is currently up and running. So join us for a nostalgic trip back to a Dereth where the golden age was not interrupted.

If you are an active paid AC1 subscriber there will be no need to create a new account for Asheron's Call 2; you will simply log into the Asheron's Call 2 game using your current Asheron's Call credentials.

Please note that this is a beta, the environment might have some known issues that we will be working on. The friend's list functionality, for example, will not be available when this new server goes into beta. As can happen during a beta release, the server might be taken down for maintenance or troubleshooting at some inconvenient times if deemed necessary. See you in game!

Asheron's Call 2 Download
Very cool, indeed. Perhaps there was some sort of 10-year clause with original publisher Microsoft that just expired?