RIP New World Aeternum

A tent city memorial has been erected outside Windsward; remembering better times for the game

 As part of layoffs Amazon has made the decision to shutter the ongoing development of New World Aeternum and any future MMORPGs. New World is effectively dead as of the announcement yesterday.  The development studios in San Diego and Irvine were laid off.  I am devastated and this announcement is difficult to understand.

 New World was riding a high with their Season 10 Nighthaven update.  Vibes were positive and the update received widespread praise.  Players were returning and content creators were creating.  We were back baby!  

 Alas it was not meant to be and it's a hard pill to swallow with the promise that Season 10 brought.  It is such a good update with amazing concepts like Catacombs and a gearing system that was going to require for more investment than past systems.  The stage was set for a better future in the game.

 The rug pull by Amazon is as insensitive to the players as it was to the developers.  I can't imagine the crunch that likely went into getting Nighthaven ready to ship, seeing the response from the community, and then to walk into a layoff.  Then we go back to the signs that were staring us in the face the entire time and it feels worse.

• The announcement to move the Nighthaven release forward to earlier in October right before the layoff announcement
• Areas of the Nighthaven zone were unfinished; large empty spaces that in retrospect were likely cut to make the date vs being areas for future expansion
• The hesitation to add any new servers to accommodate the growing queue size

 From all accounts the end user developers didn't see this coming but looking at the items noted above it is clear some level of leadership knew which makes all of this feel even worse.  Some sort of sick swan song they maybe thought the community would be happy with to ride off into the sunset.  

My Halloween themed transmog

 The worst part of this is the game is still available but there will not be any bug fixes, balance changes, or feature updates to build on the amazing changes that Season 10 brought.  We are stuck with the entirely random gear acquisition system, gutted crafting, PvP balance questions due to the large number of changes, and now a rapidly declining playerbase. 

 While Amazon may keep the doors open to the servers through 2026 the game will not be the same.  Player count plummeted following the announcement (down to ~7,000 peak users from the ~49,000 peak on Steam alone).  Logging in the world is filled with memorials and tent cities in honor of what was.  Playing game modes like 3v3 arenas were full of folks goofing off or giving it one last go before logging off for the final time.  I don't blame anyone; it is hard to take an MMO seriously that has no plans to continue development.

One more run through Starstone Barrows; ironically helping a player that has never done it before

 

 For me personally it is the end of thousands of hours of investment. The magic of MMORPGs for me is that every thing I do is working towards a future.  That constant progression is what separates these games from everything else.  The promise of decades of an online existence is intoxicating.  Every piece of furniture in my houses tells a story.  Each old piece of gear in my storage reminds me of a past version of my build. The hundreds of thousands of in game gold I squirreled away for a rainy day is now meaningless.

 Meaningless is what hurts the most.  I've been around when other games have died like Star Wars Galaxies, but for the most part every other major MMO that I've put time and effort into are still running.  Ultima Online, World of Warcraft, Dark Ages of Camelot, Guild Wars 2, and more... all still plodding along in some form or another.  And while Star Wars Galaxies hurt to see go it was it's time as the developers had moved the game away from what made it special in the first place.  New World is different and will be different in the history of MMOs.

One more 3v3 arena with friends

 

 Thank you to the developers that brought me this game and gave us the only decent MMORPG in the past 10 years.  New World never asked for more than the box cost and was the "casual dad gamer" game of choice.  I loved every damn minute of this game.  I loved every freaking second I spent defending this game against the haters.

  Stop killing games.  Fuck you Amazon.   

Looking at my house in Windsward

So many memories tied to each item in my house.  Its a mess, but its my mess.