The January update delivers some surprises: In addition to three more regions, Lost Ark gets many unexpected features and end-game content at launch.
Shortly before the release of the long-awaited action role-playing MMORPG Lost Ark on 11 February 2022, publisher Amazon Games has once again published a big entry in the (Developer Blog) that has it all: The European version that can be played here will offer more content directly at launch than previously expected and will thus be closer to the already playable releases from Korea, Japan and Russia.
We summarise all the newly announced features and content for you in this article.
Three additional in-game regions for launch
The most exciting announcement for many fans is probably that there will be a total of three additional late-game regions to explore. Once you have reached the endgame, you will be able to complete more quests, slay bosses and conquer Chaos Dungeons alone or with a group in these areas.
Yorn
Yorn is located in the deep underground of the continent of Rohendel and is home to the Umar, a group of highly skilled dwarves. According to the developers, the area, which was built by the dwarven architects in centuries of work, should turn out particularly impressive visually.
Feiton
The second new area is a complete continent: Feiton is the home of the half-demons, the so-called Delains – those who have played the beta might have already found out that an important story character belongs to this race.
The lands of this continent, however, are less inviting than the brightly coloured Punika, because they were poisoned during the Chain Wars. The area is under the control of the powerful assassin organisation Avesta, which should guarantee an exciting plot thread.
Punika
The last new area is called Punika. If the name makes you think of the well-known fruit juice brand, you are not completely wrong: Punika is a magical tropical paradise and offers colourful and beautiful nature with many sights, including the lively Nia Village and the tranquil Starstand Beach. However, the fauna here is also extremely hostile, so you shouldn’t be blinded by the island’s beauty.
What else is new?
Besides the new territories, Amazon Games has announced other important features and info for the launch of the EU version:
- Tier 3 gear and some T3 dungeons like Orha’s Well will be available right at launch.
- The Velganos Guardian Raid will also be right at launch.
- More T3 content to follow after release.
- The combat level cap for your characters has been increased to 60.
- Character names will not be immediately available again after deleting a character.
- A total of 173 Steam Achievements have been added to the game.
- You can now change your character’s voice, there should be 3 to 4 options per class.
- The original Korean dubbing can now be selected.
- Some end-game content will be harder than in the closed beta.
- Many cutscenes can now be skipped.
By the way, if you look closely at the following trailer, you can already discover parts of the new areas:
Divided opinions among hardcore fans
If you’re confused about terms like Tier 3 gear: The end-game items and the places where they can be obtained are divided into different tiers – in English Tier.
Just like in other MMOs, players must first collect and upgrade items from T1 and T2 raids or dungeons in order to gain the necessary combat power for T3 content. The fact that T3 equipment is already available at launch is something MMO veterans can imagine as if the Naxxramas raid had been available right at the start of World of Warcraft.
This announcement is now causing resentment among some hardcore fans who seem to have internalised the typical MMO mentality: Instead of playing at their own pace, they feel compelled to achieve everything as quickly as possible in order not to lose touch with the top players.
Are they going crazy releasing everything up to Papunika? Do you know how hard this grindfest is going to be? I doubt people will make alts if they have to go that far into the game
This is absolutely terrible to release T3 at launch. A vast majority of NA/EU will have no LA experience AND be limited to 15 classes. Why not split the content? All the talk about experimenting with alts blah blah, and now this? Where is the time to properly equip alts? We basically need to decide on a main class right now and invest everything in it.
Bad thing for me, I’m very, very surprised they wouldn’t time the content and let everyone enjoy a slower experience. Instead we are expected to rush to T3 with limited experience and missing 7(?) classes? Many players may want to try multiple classes before finding their main class, and that will be very difficult now. And there is so much collectible content/account progress to catch up on. I could go on and on… this is crazy!
The path to these players’ goal of having achieved everything in the endgame now becomes significantly longer. Since significantly more gold can be earned in the other regions in the T3 content, trading in the auction house could also play a role – those who rake in a lot of gold early on can possibly equip themselves cheaply with important pieces of equipment such as the engravings (passive talents).
However, not all players see this announcement so tragically: Many point out that the T1 and T2 content would only keep even casual players busy for a few weeks – and that a lack of content is the most common reason why many MMOs die after only a few months.
I’ve been playing MMOs for almost 2 decades now. 90-95% of the MMOs I’ve played died (or went Free2Play with a tiny player base) within the first 6-12 months. Almost ALL of these MMOs died due to TOO LITTLE CONTENT.
It was incredibly fun for the first few weeks to a month, and then you hit a wall where there was just nothing left to do. TBC Classic and New World are two examples of MMO launches I’ve played in the last 6 months, and both had this problem. This is why player retention is fucked in most of these MMOs.
I was worried the same thing would happen with Lost Ark if we were stuck on T1 and T2 for too long, even though the best content seems to be on T3. I honestly can’t understand why people are complaining about this.
How do you guys feel about this? Do you feel compelled by the collective progression mania to reach the endgame as quickly as possible? Or do you play at your own pace anyway? Drop us a line in the comments
