What Cave2 actually is
Cave2 runs at www.cave2.eu and I checked the site myself today (July 15, 2026): it loads fine, full content, no parking page or dead panel. The project shows up repeatedly in this year's server roundups, and MMO Top Forge's 2026 ranking lists it as the number two oldschool pick, describing it as a nostalgic level 105 PvM Hard/Medium server with no alchemy, aimed at players who miss the pre-alchemy era. The same profile appears on metin2pserver.net, which also gives a start date of December 17, 2025, so we are looking at a server roughly seven months into its run.
The concept is a middle ground that a lot of oldschool projects get wrong. It removes alchemy completely, which changes itemization and PvP balance back to how the game felt years ago, but it does not throw out every quality of life system along with it. Pets, mounts, belts and offline shops are all in, and the ranking descriptions mention Beta maps plus boss content around Dragon and Azrael. So it is not a museum piece frozen at 2007; it is the old itemization philosophy with the annoying parts of old Metin2 sanded down.
Style and difficulty
Every listing tags Cave2 as PvM Hard to Medium. In practice that means metin stones and bosses take real effort, drop rates are tuned so farming stays meaningful for weeks rather than days, and you should not expect to hit cap in a weekend. If your idea of fun is a 500x server where you are full geared by Sunday evening, this is the wrong address. If you like the grind where a single good drop actually moves your character forward, this is exactly the target audience.
The server is Romanian in origin but clearly built for an international crowd: the site offers language support for German, English, Spanish, French, Hungarian, Italian, Polish, Portuguese, Turkish and Czech on top of Romanian. That is a good sign for finding a guild in your own language, and the site links a Discord for coordination.
The current population, honestly
Here is where I want to be straight with you, because this is a community overview and not an advertisement. The live stats on the official site right now show 260 accounts, 237 characters and 7 guilds. That is a small snapshot. It either means a fresh season or relaunch recently went live, or the population has thinned out since the December start and these counters were reset at some point. The news section on the site is currently empty, which does not help clarify things, so I would treat this as an early-stage or rebuilding community rather than a packed server.
Small population cuts both ways. The economy is thin and finding party members off peak hours can be slow, but on the other hand you can actually matter: top guild spots are reachable, the leaderboard is not locked up by two-year veterans, and staff on small servers tend to be far more responsive.
One discrepancy you should know about
The 2026 ranking articles consistently describe Cave2 as a level 105 server. However, when I checked the live rankings on the official site today, the top players (Priky, ASU and Lips, all Jinno) are sitting at level 75, and the offline shop counter shows zero shops open. The most likely explanation is an early-season soft cap at 75 that will be raised in stages toward 105, which is a common pattern on oldschool servers to keep the playerbase progressing together. But that is my reading, not an official statement, and with the news section empty I could not confirm it. Ask on their Discord before you commit serious hours if the final cap matters to you.
This is also your general reminder: private servers change fast. Rates, caps, events and even the existence of a server can shift between the time a post is written and the time you read it. Always check the official Cave2 site for the current state before downloading anything.
Who should join, who should skip it
- Join if you want pre-alchemy itemization, a PvM-first grind, and you are fine being an early settler on a small server where your progress is visible on the leaderboards.
- Join if you play in one of the supported languages and want an international oldschool community that is not dominated by one region.
- Skip it if you need a big, liquid economy from day one, heavy PvP action around the clock, or instant gratification rates.
- Skip it if the 75 versus 105 cap question is a dealbreaker for you and you do not want to wait for clarification.
Does Cave2 have alchemy?
No. The complete removal of alchemy is the core selling point. Builds and PvM balance work the way they did before dragon stones existed. Pets, mounts, belts and offline shops are still available, so it is not a full retro strip-down.
What is the level cap on Cave2?
Ranking sites list 105, but the live top players are currently at level 75, which points to an early-season cap. Check the official site or their Discord for the current number, since the site's news section was empty when I looked.
When did Cave2 start and is it still online?
The listed start date is December 17, 2025, and I verified the site was fully online on July 15, 2026. Current live counters show 260 accounts and 7 guilds, so it is a small but active project, possibly on a fresh season.
What languages does Cave2 support?
It is a Romanian-origin server with site language support for German, English, Spanish, French, Hungarian, Italian, Polish, Portuguese, Turkish and Czech, so most European players will find their language covered.
That is everything I could verify from the outside. I have not sunk hundreds of hours into it myself, so if you are playing on Cave2 right now, or you played the December launch, reply below with your experience: real drop rates, how the 75 cap situation actually works, staff quality, whatever you have. First-hand reviews are worth more than any ranking article, and they help the next person reading this thread decide.