New World Amrine Excavation Preview: Action RPG Mechanics in an MMORPG World
Amazon's new MMORPG New World is a promising fresh take on a familiar genre. Taking place on Aeternum Island somewhere in the Atlantic Ocean, New World encourages players to band together in groups of up to five, join factions, build settlements, and explore the secrets and lore of a world where people have found themselves virtually immortal. As players explore, they will need to gather resources and make use of the robust crafting system, improving their chances against various hostile creatures and other players. Similar to Greedfall, New World blends magic and realism to create an experience rich in lore and possibility.
What makes New World unique is its ability to combine classic, familiar MMORPG features with action RPG mechanics. Rather than incorporating auto-locked targeting, players will need to aim, dodge, block, and time their attacks just as they would in a single-player action RPG when fighting other players and monsters. Players are also not locked into a class, and their class will be determined instead by the weapons they choose from a growing list that includes bows, hammers, staves, rifles, and swords and shields.
In a preview event for New World, developers demonstrated one of the latest expeditions to be added to the alpha, the Amrine Excavation. This expedition serves as the first major opportunity for players to experience a raid in a more contained dungeon space after leveling up to 25. It also contains New World's first bosses and rewards powerful loot and useful crafting materials. In Amrine Excavation, players investigate the dig site of archaeologist Simon Grey, whose team went missing while searching for ancient tech. The dungeon involves encounters with new creatures, including ghosts, bat-like grunts, and hulking, demonic undead, and puzzles to solve to progress deeper into the dig site.
During the preview, developers explained that they plan to include more dungeons, focusing on three major themes: more social interactions and cooperative play; a new PvE experience in each addition; and deeper lore and story content. So far, the team intends to introduce dungeon experiences for players who reach level 35, 45, 55, and 60 as well, with the potential for more following launch.
With the addition of Amrine Excavation, three new weapons classes have been added to the game: spears, rapiers, and the ice gauntlet. With the update, weapons mastery trees have also been rebalanced, and combat has been upgraded to move faster and be more responsive. Additionally, new crafting materials have arrived, along with discoverable recipes to completely overhaul and deepen the crafting system and make it a more central focus of New World's experience.
By far the most intriguing thing about the Amrine Excavation, and New World in general, is the inclusion of mechanics like classless progression, crafting, and the more physical action of its RPG-style combat. New World feels like a classic action RPG while still maintaining the familiarity and social factors of other popular MMOs. The raid requires more communication from the individual group members to be successful, as everyone will need to dodge, block, and aim in real time. This experience can bring PvP and PvE players together and allow their abilities to complement one another.
New World's combat appears to have a Dark Souls influence, as the enemy creatures are fairly unrelenting. The sophisticated enemy AI comes programmed with complicated moves that require a more strategic player response. For example, one of the mini-bosses available in Amrine could summon waves of ghosts players had to weave between to survive. In another attack, if players found themselves caught within a magic, magenta ring that appeared around the creature, it could stun and devastate them in only a few hits. Players needed to work together and strategize to duck around this boss and chip away at its health without dying.
During the preview event, developers reiterated their commitment to creating a unique MMORPG experience for fans of the genre. Ahead of New World's first day, they hope to introduce new things for players to do, a wider variety of creatures, and further lore, including possible alternate lore delivery methods like tie-in comics. Amrine Excavation already includes a fun new NPC, Barkimedes, who adds some humor and light into the dark, atmospheric dungeon crawl. It is likely players will see more colorful characters like this who may even have special requests for them to complete. There is also plenty of lore included for the players who seek it. For example, writing on walls in the dungeon unravel parts of the mystery of the Amrine dig site, and players must interpret the meaning of this text for themselves.
New World and its developers seem committed to the innate promise of delivering players a game, environment, and experience that is truly unique within its space. New World has the potential to be a new classic in MMORPG gaming. The Amrine Excavation already feels polished, with fast-paced action combat that requires real, meaningful communication with a group for a true co-op experience. It is exciting to see an MMO hybridize and include elements of traditional action RPGs, and it will be interesting to see if other games begin to adopt a similar philosophy in the future. For now, New World is definitely a game worth keeping an eye on.
New World launches August 31, 2021 on PC. Players may join the closed beta on July 20, 2021 by pre-ordering the game or signing up on New World's website. Screen Rant attended a digital preview event for the purpose of this preview.