Lost Ark launched on Steam in 2022 with impressive player numbers, but quickly lost popularity. Now the developers are announcing major changes.
Over 1.3 million players flocked to Steam when Lost Ark was released to explore the world of the action MMO. But after its hugely successful launch, player numbers quickly declined.
Today, only a fraction of the former numbers are being achieved, and Steam ratings are also plummeting. However, the developers now want to counteract this with major changes.
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What is going to change?
The plan for Lost Ark was originally announced in a Korean livestream, but on Steam the developers are also summarizing their plans for the Western community. The main focus is on making it easier for players to progress in the game and reducing grind. This is particularly important at the beginning of the game, where progress is very slow and resource-intensive.
Weapons and armor
The April update will significantly reduce the cost of upgrading equipment such as weapons and armor. More specifically, this applies to honing and transcendence.
- Advanced Sharpening: The shard, silver, and gold costs will be reduced by 20 percent. Material costs will also be halved.
- Armor Transcendence: The gold costs for Restoration and Purification have been significantly reduced.
- Weapon Transcendence: The gold costs for Restoration and Purification have been significantly reduced.
Jewels
According to the developers, the jewel system currently limits character progression and flexibility in play styles. However, Smilegate has not yet found a definitive solution to this problem: The development studio has only announced that it is working on a solution.
Class balance
While some balance changes have already been made to the classes in the Korean version of Lost Ark, they are still pending in the Western version. As announced by Smilegate, there is no exact plan yet, but the balance adjustments are expected to be released with the April update.
T3 Deadzone
Many players are finding it difficult to upgrade their equipment between equipment levels 1580 and 1620. This weak point is to be addressed soon, but there is no exact plan yet. In the meantime, builds that are particularly affected will be supported.
However, there is bad news in the Steam update for players who enjoy Lost Ark in German: since the German and French versions of the game are hardly used, support for both languages will be discontinued in May. From then on, dialogues and texts will only be available in English.
