Imagining Impossible Virtual Worlds: Final Fantasy XI Private Servers as Imagined Living Community Archives

Using modern archival theory and semi-structured interviews, this article examines how Massively-Multiplayer Online Role-Playing Game (MMO) private servers, and their participants function as imagined living community archives and the challenges that occur. The article presents findings of a series of interviews conducted with 15 members of the Final Fantasy XI (FFXI) private server community and investigates the value private servers provide to the preservation of virtual worlds. Player interviews speak to the power of private servers and their ability to allow them to relive past eras the virtual world in which they play and exist in, while interviews with private server developers uncovered the challenges of recreating past eras of a virtual world. Finally, this paper argues that by hiring the private server developers to help recreate these virtual worlds, game companies could address player demand, profit from the nostalgia, and compensate those who have already been voluntarily preserving their game.