The Amazon Game Studios MMO New World's launch was a massive success. Steam charts showed a record of over 700,000 concurrent New World players on day one, leading to huge server queues. Its all-time peak came just a few days later, at over 910,000 players. If New World's numbers and community engagement had frozen right then and there, things would have likely been different for the Amazon release.
However, players were quick to find design issues that prevented them from truly playing the game the way they wanted. Still, enjoyment seemed to last thanks to an engaging PvP - the Faction Wars - and interesting PvE potential with Expeditions and lots of gathering and crafting. What really started to spread negativity within the community and drove players away was New World's duplication glitch and the subsequent economic disaster, starting a chain of events that led to less communication from the developer and more distrust from players. As it is now, it's hard to say whether the game is still worth jumping into.
New World's Present State and Future Potential
The state of New World post-launch wasn't too bad, but it was clear the game was not ready to be released when it was. After plenty of bans that dealt with cheaters and exploiters, most of them permanent, players were happy about the developer's renewed communication as it shared future plans. There was a lot of hype surrounding the release of the "Into the Void" November update, which was meant to introduce lots of enemies and a new weapon, as well as fix old issues and address more pressing problems.
However, the patch was filled with secret changes to New World's core mechanics, like the way players could farm for endgame gear and increase their Watermark and Gear Score. The crafting system was also changed in a way that makes it more difficult to get to level cap with crafting skills, simply because it costs more Gold and more materials to do the same thing in more time. These things combined had a negative impact on the community, especially because with all its nerfs, New World still had a lot of known issues.
The most recent patch in New World changed the way Motes are obtained, and it included even more nerfs. However, things are looking up thanks to how Amazon promises it will deal with the Watermark system in coming patches; introducing an Expertise value to determine what level players' gear will be. The December patch is currently available on the public test realm, and it includes an engaging holiday event. Currently, New World is a great game to play for newcomers and those who have been playing for a while, so much so that they have their preferred gear and builds as well as skills leveled up.
For those in between, New World is not at its best, because the most fun aspects of the game (and its coming patch) are leveling and the PvP endgame. This means that those who have already leveled up their characters but are a long way from getting the gear and skills they want are likely going to enjoy New World the least. Ultimately, Amazon seems willing to pour more effort and resources into the game to improve moving forward, and there is hope the developer will listen to its community.
New World is available now on PC.