Amazon’s New World MMO Impressions – Not All-New, Not All-World

New World promises a lush and strange continent for players to explore and conquer, filled with dangerous enemies and the promise of glory and treasure. It’s a modern MMORPG in every way: absolutely gorgeous, surprisingly stable to launch, and with a good voice performance. There is also an extensive network of constant communication with the players. As the queues pile up and players try to join the same server as all their friends, once I log in, I enjoy a smooth journey through the adventure world of developer Amazon.

The new World feels like the first MMO designed without World of warcraftDNA as a central characteristic. He is not concerned with killing Blizzard’s goliath, but rather, he is content to be his own. At first, the game manages to capture the best part of embarking on a new adventure. I found my feet and then looked out over the horizon of a vast world waiting to be explored.

Large parts of The new World they are polished and competent. I begin as a shipwrecked sailor on the shores of Aeternum, a mythical island full of treasures and curses. My Captain is consumed by the dark and turbulent mists of the island, and I must fight my way through my former crew, now corrupt and macabre, to the safety of an established settlement. No one can die in Aeternum, so all doomed travel survivors have decided to buckle up and try to build a civilization here.

Image: Amazon Game Studios

Combat and leveling feel great, and The new World He throws strong options at me without overwhelming me. As my sailor advances and becomes a traveling and marauding mercenary, I choose to focus on combat with axes and sword and shield. I can also change weapons at any time. Tired of being a tank? I can equip a life staff or an ice glove and become a mage. The environments are beautifully designed, and I walk through lush wilderness or go into haunted caves to slay hideous monsters.

It almost feels bad to complain about the rest of the game, because the production values ​​are so high and there are ubiquitous signs of care in textures, diaries, and monster models. But the character creator, for example, is extremely boring. A negative viral Steam review simply says ‘no cat girls’.

The player character in an MMO allows us to create the lens through which we view their world, but there is not much variety in the people I see around me. The new World. There are no elves or bunnies or Twi’lek; it’s just a lot of humans, some of whom have a cool hat or scars, running around with their various pieces of armor. Some of them have names like Gideon Greyhawk and John Holland; others are called things like Swaglord420 and Weebscum Uwu.

These silly names hurt my dive, and the island of Aeternum is already hard to connect. Since my days in the game, it seems that Amazon has removed tradition to address early concerns about colonialism, so when I get to the first settlement, I find that it is run by caring women and people of color. They need me to kill monsters and crazed beasts, which is the objectively correct thing to do when living on a magical island. The game is determined not to be controversial at first glance, but in the end, it is still a game about exploring and colonizing a new continent. You feel disjointed to the point of being naive.

Image: Amazon Game Studios

The game’s faction system, on the other hand, is one of its most attractive offerings. There is the sneaky and erudite Syndicate, the impulsive and fanatical Covenant, and the brutal and belligerent Marauders. The faction is not a permanent choice, you can trade, albeit with a 120-day timer, and if you want to join a company of players, the equivalent of a guild in other MMOs, they must be under the same banner. In short, even if I’m not very interested in fighting various supernatural beings, be it my fallen shipmates or twisted monsters emerging from the mist, I can at least enjoy beating another player or claiming a city.

The settlements in the world are at stake; factions can fight for them in Wars, which are 50v50 PvP battles. If a faction claims a deal, it can control things like tax rates and local area benefits. Players can choose to go in and out of PvP, so they can leave a settlement without being installed.

When these systems work well, it’s satisfying, like the polished triple-A version of a survival game like Conan Exiles or Ark. There’s room for player rivalry and back-and-forth battles, whether it’s jumping on an ill-fated solo player under the syndicate banner, or running away when I see a squad of Covenant with muskets on the horizon.

The success or failure of The new World it’s going to depend on the social scene that’s already building around the game, which is driving much of its early game. Players are grouped into Discords to coordinate which server they want to roll on and which faction they want to join. People ignore the tradition provided by the factions and create their own, choosing who they think would be a glorious victor or a satisfying underdog. There is even a fan-made Zillow for the gaming real estate market. The immersion is not the point; is a social realm that only MMOs can adequately deliver, and games like The new World they are few and far between.

Will the first wave of players stay? Depends on if The new World it can stand up to their machinations. If each server is dominated by a single faction, or PvP can’t hold people’s attention, the game seems doomed to wither. The game itself is not really the main indicator of The new WorldThe Success – It’s the vibrant scenes building around it on Discords and on social media, where players are planning their best approach to claiming the island against all stakeholders.