Court filing reveals why Stormforge and others are shutting down: AFKCraft Ltd (the Hong Kong company behind Turtle WoW) must shut down ALL private servers it owns or controls.
https://www.courtlistener.com/docket/71235075/56/1/blizzard-entertainment-inc-v-turtle-wow/
>A consent judgment filed April 10, 2026 in federal court in California lays out exactly what happened. Blizzard sued Turtle WoW, and we now know the corporate entity behind the server was a Hong Kong company called AFKCraft Limited.
>AFKCraft didn't just agree to shut down Turtle WoW. The injunction goes way further than that. It permanently bars AFKCraft from operating, managing, controlling, or holding any financial interest in ANY private server for ANY Blizzard game. Not just WoW. Not just Turtle WoW. Anything Blizzard owns.
>On top of that, the ruling says any company or entity that AFKCraft owns or controls, now or in the future, has to comply with the same order. So if AFKCraft had a hand in other servers you played on, those are covered too.
>They're also banned from handing off any Turtle WoW code, server software, social media accounts, or promotional materials to anyone else. The ruling specifically calls out preventing a "successor" project. So nobody's picking up where they left off using the same codebase.
>The suit named about a dozen people by their real names and aliases — Torta/Shenna, Shagu, Akalix, brotalnia, and others. This particular judgment only covers AFKCraft the company, but those individuals are also defendants in the case.
>Both sides waived the right to appeal and the settlement terms are confidential. Blizzard isn't playing around.
TL;DR: AFKCraft Ltd was the company running many servers. Court order says they have to shut down everything, can't transfer the project to anyone, and any other entity they control is bound by the same ruling. That likely explains why other servers went dark at the same time.