to align themselves with a particular faction. Aligning with a faction will give characters a head start in skills and specialized equipment. Development After a number of years in the making, Fallen Earth developers announced in a June 2008 press release that the game had reached feature-complete status. In October 2008, the Fallen Earth website reported that the game had reached content-complete status. The first wave of Alpha tests began in August 2008, and closed Beta testing began in February 2009. As part of a promotional campaign, Fallen Earth announced a National Tour on their website in February 2009. They planned to sponsor IGDA meetings, and participating in events across the United States, doing public demonstrations promoting the game and taking part in question-and-answer sessions with the audience. The game was released on September 22, 2009, with pre-orders from Direct2Drive, Steam and the official website granting early access from September 9, 2009. On March 10, 2010, Icarus Studios announced the beta release of Fallen Earth for the Mac OS X platform. The Mac OS X version of Fallen Earth uses Wine technology and requires an Intel-based Mac system with a discrete graphics processor. On April 5, 2010, the Fallen Earth team announced that Lee Hammock was leaving Fallen Earth to work as story designer on a new MMO title, Gargantuan. On April 30, 2010, chief executive officer of Icarus Studios, Inc., James Hettinger, announced a restructure of the company resources and staffing, effective immediately. Among these changes was the promotion of Fallen Earth writer/content developer Wes Platt to Director of Content Development. On May 4, 2010, Fallen Earth, LLC, announced a new distribution partnership with Interactive Gaming Software (IGS), a subsidiary of Atari USA. On June 15, 2011, it was announced that GamersFirst had purchased the intellectual property of the game and that the game would be going "free to play". The game went "Free to Play" on 13 October 2011. Fallen Earth server's were taken offline in October 2019. Little Orbit is working on a reboot of the game with no set release date. According to CEO Mattscott. a fresh server called fallen earth classic will be launching soon. a complete server wipe. and fresh start for players. On October 27, 2021, Fallen Earth's servers were put back online by Little orbit subsidiary Gamersfirst. Reception Fallen Earth earned the runner-up spot for Best New MMO of 2009 by Beckett