Original Metin2 serverfile leak - September 2009 (and the journey of getting them)

[Exynox 1534]

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Hello, guys and girls,

This release is something sentimental to me, so either brace up or skip this story. It was late 2009 or early 2010 when I stumbled upon this post. It is the only remaining copy on the internet of the original Chinese forum post providing the leaked files. The files were originally distributed through a Chinese service called Rayfile, a quasi-P2P file sharing system based on the obscure FS2You protocol, described in this scientific paper. For us, mortals, a MegaUpload link was provided, and we all know of the famous bust that Thanos-snapped everything hosted there out of existence. (or maybe the hard drives are locked in some FBI basement somewhere, idk)

I downloaded the files, but being just a young lad who only wanted to play some Metin2 (i.e. with no sysadmin experience), I meddled with the files, trying to somehow run them on my 3,06 GHz Pentium 4, socket 478, Windows XP potato computer. Check out the picture on the side. This bad boy could barely run the Metin2 client -- but I had dreams, dreams - I say! At the time I didn't even know FreeBSD existed. There were some tutorials around, but looking back, I think they were for Metin1, which was leaked at around the same time. Nonetheless, these guides required you to install VMware (rip ✝) Player, instead of Microsoft Virtual PC we got used to. It was rough, as at the time, VMware Player didn't have the ability to create new virtual machines - this was reserved only to VMware Workstation. Therefore, those guides also provided you empty virtual machine files. By some miracle, my machine could run the VM even without VT-d, which kind of kickstarted my interest in administrating computers. I promptly started playing around with Windows 98 VMs.

I was sidetracked. I failed at getting the sweet Metin2 server running, so I deleted the files, thinking they were broken or something. I didn't know better. Then the mcncc.com InstantServer was released for the less talented like me, and that's how I started regaining interest in Metin2 servers.

...which brings back to the issue at hand. I soon realised how dumb I was for deleting the files. I couldn't even find the forum post, not to mention that in the meanwhile, MegaUpload was reduced to atoms.

That was that, until a few days ago, when I somehow found the post.

There it was, the original Rayfile link:

fs2you://Y2FjaGVmaWxlOS5yYXlmaWxlLmNvbS96aC1jbi9kb3dubG9hZC9iYjBmMjFmODY0ZjgyMjJjNjAzNTBiNTRmOWRmMjQzYy95dDIucmFyfDE1NTU2NzA0Nw==/

And once the obvious base64 string was decoded, I was reunited with my old friend:

cachefile9.rayfile.com/zh-cn/download/bb0f21f864f8222c60350b54f9df243c/yt2.rar|155567047

That's how we now know that the original file we're looking for is yt2.rar, with a length of 155567047 bytes (148,36 MiB). The original file is nowhere to be found: if you somehow have it, by any miracle, please contribute!

Still, plugging "yt2.rar" into DuckDuckGo, led me to an epvp post, where I learned that one of the files in that archive was called "game0901.tar.gz". I kept digging, and found two traces of the file:

• https://web.archive.org/web/20101015142910/http://patch.queenmt2.eu/benfakedegilim/
• https://web.archive.org/web/20240317070210/http://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache:https://chomikuj.pl/leonek123321

The second website still had the listing for game0901.tar.gz saved in Google's cache. It sadly was deleted from the website itself, but based on the metadata, I then knew two things:

1. game0901.tar.gz was 135,8 M(i)B in size.
2. The other files in yt2.rar were probably: mysql.tar.gz, ports.tar.gz, and lib.tar.gz 

So I paid my 2€ to the Chomik website (lmao, what a name), which was in itself an adventure. I now had my hands on some of the files and on a 2007-2008 Gameforge Polish client, which I'll probably also upload, but can't verify its authenticity. To my disappointment, mysql.tar.gz seems to have been tampered with, seeing some 2017 timestamps in there. The tarballs for the other two files also had 2022 timestamps, not to mention that the file sizes wouldn't really add up, no matter how I arranged the files or what compression I used. Still, better than nothing.

Now, at least I had some more information to continue my search. Luckily, I tended to hoard a lot of useless Metin2 junk, which would nowadays qualify as prime Pokemon server material. So out I pulled my DVD backups, and I searched for hours.

And suddenly, there it was... but not in the way I expected it:

A .tar.gz archive, precisely 135,798 MiB in size, which matched the one stored by our Chomik friend. And the timestamp inside the archive was promising too: 1251810149 - 01.09.2009, 13:02 UTC. Translated into Hong Kong time, that would still be September 1st, 20:02. Which matches with the "0901" in "game0901.tar.gz". Why is it called "filer.tar.gz" is anyone's guess. I saw that there are some tutorials using that name. My guess is that could be a Swedish or an incorrect Turkish plural for the English "file"...

So, while "yt2.rar" is still at large, 15 years after that delete, I'm happy at last. I managed to find the most important file:

Name: game0901.tar.gz / filer.tar.gz
Size: 142394597 bytes (135 MiB)
Date: Tue Sep 01 2009 13:02:29 GMT+0000
CRC32: 6CB5D7C0
SHA256: 09295B3EDC9A4F465038E80C702B0BCC1DBDCE61B0478FB72D37BDD9D2A21548
SHA1: E5DF2443F7997F4ED034590FD8DCA9D133DAC1B4
MD5: 9E954C11CF065BDD647BFBB6D6FA9344

If it's still unclear what the archives are for, here's a short description:

• game0901.tar.gz - 2009 server files from Yitian2, a Metin2 official server that ran in the Hong Kong SAR, China
• lib.tar.gz - shared object files required for running the various binaries
• mysql.tar.gz (modified in 2017 by a certain "Yusuf") - MySQL data files for the server database
• ports.tar.gz - FreeBSD ports tree, one of the ways through which you can install applications by building them.

 

I hope we can preserve a bit of the private servers scene's history with this release. And please, if you somehow still have "yt2.rar", it would be amazing to upload it for us.

Regards,
Exynox.

[AZICKO 7126]

2009, what memories...

It was from 2009 that I started to really become interested in IT and the world of servers on Metin2. And that's also where I realized that my first computer was not as powerful as people had made me believe! My parents scammed me, I only had 512 MB of RAM... 

[Intel 733]

2 hours ago, AZICKO said:

2009, what memories...

It was from 2009 that I started to really become interested in IT and the world of servers on Metin2. And that's also where I realized that my first computer was not as powerful as people had made me believe! My parents scammed me, I only had 512 MB of RAM... 

Looks like a recurring thing.. even I had tried to run an hamachi server on a Pentium 4 HT/1GB DDR1 RAM

Suffice to say, it was able to handle only one player online

I remember then building for the first time my PC (Asus M4N82 Deluxe/AMD Phenom II X4 955/Corsair Dominator 8GB DDR2 1066 MHz), burning down the older hard disk because I plugged the SATA cable into the PCI-E PSU port..

 

Edited March 17 by Intel

[Helia01 2065]

MCNCC forever 

[Exynox 1534]

3 hours ago, Intel said:

I had tried to run an hamachi server on a Pentium 4 HT/1GB DDR1 RAM

I see it's an universal experience. I only had 512MB of RAM, but I thought I could run Windows Vista xD. Also... 1GB of DDR1? That was a lot for the time!

[rawn3cr0 1]

Wow, nice job. Also old but gold xD

Can you upload client please?

[Intel 733]

2 hours ago, Exynox said:

I see it's an universal experience. I only had 512MB of RAM, but I thought I could run Windows Vista xD. Also... 1GB of DDR1? That was a lot for the time!

1gb was a lot? Uh.. it was a 999.99€ pre-built PC in 2005 with a Foxconn motherboard and an ATi GPU. 2$ PSU obviously (it fried).

Oh I forgot, I remember buying additional 512 MB of ram when DDR3 was already out. I had to go and spend like 70€ for. freaking. 5 1 2. mega. bytes. of ram.

I mean, it made my PC survive a little bit more until I had no choice but to upgrade ahah

[ValkeryE 64]

Ahhh, nostalgia I also started with metin in 2009. So-called Rain files - InstantFiles, mcncc.com. Virtual PC. Client 2008 unpatched. Generating exe files along with the server IP. Frequent problems with "bin/sh" which involved deleting the server and reinstalling it because no one knew how to fix it. That happiness when you first noticed the GM effect above your head or could put on black steel armor +9 Nice memories

 

What do you think. When will the next src be leaked :D?

Edited March 17 by ValkeryE

[granpa123 9]

firstly thanks for the files as i remember that way back then it was a real hit and miss time when you were learning how to get them to do anything as back then it was fun and i can not wait to have a look at these

as in my collection i think i still have the original Rain and Profizocker94 and even KAY311 files and maybe the 2010 client too

 

so thanks again

 

Granpa123

 

 

 

[Shogun 4484]

very exciting story, when's the netflix series coming up?

Edited March 18 by Shogun

[Exynox 1534]

9 hours ago, ValkeryE said:

What do you think. When will the next src be leaked :D?

I guess it's only a matter of time... I've seen proof of a more recent leak, from after the official source tree switched to DirectX 9. But don't get your hopes up, it's been a while since the leak and it's probably kept really secret.

 

9 hours ago, granpa123 said:

as in my collection i think i still have the original Rain and Profizocker94 and even KAY311 files and maybe the 2010 client too

The Rain files are also posted on this forum; I probably have some others as well, maybe I'll post them if there's enough interest.

[Gurgarath 2446]

Love me some of that sweet old nostalgia post. I often dig up stuff like this on the internet, mostly to no avail. It is crazy how things we saw everywhere and everyday became vaporware in the span of just a few years or a cataclysmic digital event (Megaupload). I still remember how I was going crazy with my VirtualPC in the sweet year 2009 on my Vista desktop trying to make it handle the hamachi server. Good times

[r00t3r 67]

On 3/17/2024 at 1:52 PM, Helia01 said:

MCNCC forever 

Oh, yes, with virtual pc !

[ATAG 309]

Yep, i also got it from mcncc i guess... Took weeks to find and download it Also contained web files of longju (maybe?)

Edited April 1 by ATAG

[Exynox 1534]

Yes, I've also heard that those webfiles were also published around that time, but I haven't been able to find them. Since mcncc is dead, I'd say that website is unobtanium. Still, it's not that much of a loss, since I doubt anyone would want to use a chinese website.

It would be nice to check out the quirks, such as the fact that due to Chinese regulations, you had to enter your government identification number in order to register. I also suppose that's the origin of the "social_id" column in the account table, albeit the length is 13 characters, which matches with the Korean RRN, a 13-digit long number, whereas the Chinese was 15 digits at the time.

[Intel 733]

On 4/1/2024 at 3:30 PM, Exynox said:

Yes, I've also heard that those webfiles were also published around that time, but I haven't been able to find them. Since mcncc is dead, I'd say that website is unobtanium. Still, it's not that much of a loss, since I doubt anyone would want to use a chinese website.

It would be nice to check out the quirks, such as the fact that due to Chinese regulations, you had to enter your government identification number in order to register. I also suppose that's the origin of the "social_id" column in the account table, albeit the length is 13 characters, which matches with the Korean RRN, a 13-digit long number, whereas the Chinese was 15 digits at the time.

Considering Korea has similar laws (account sharing can be legit identity theft in Korea), then, maybe? I mean let's not forget Korea has the checks for the hours played during the day (even LoL has that shit)