Valheim is an open-world Viking-themed survival game that allows players to live the Viking dream with up to 10 players. Though the game is in early access, it has seen tremendous support as it surpassed 6 million sales in just over 6 weeks since going live. With COVID around to slow things down, Valheim hasn't had much of a chance to push out many updates, yet the game has maintained its popularity since its release. This is due in part to its accessibility, such as the combat, the building, the multiplayer, and certainly, the small download size as games tend to be hard drive hogs nowadays.
Valheim takes place in a big open world that is procedurally generated, allowing players to experience a game world unique to them. The game utilizes a survival mechanic that the player must take into account if they are to survive, as the inhabitants are not friendly. The core gameplay tasks players with keeping their character fed for health benefits, as well as the need to harvest the lands of its resources such as wood, stone, and many kinds of ore. If a player wishes, they can take up to 9 of their friends along to brave the harsh lands together. With the ease with which players can play together, it's no wonder modders are already working to turn Valheim into an MMO.
The Case for a Valheim MMO
Valheim is still in early access but has many features that make it suitable for an MMO. One major reason is the worlds in Valheim are massive, with roughly over 300 square kilometers of area. That is a lot for players to not only explore but completely customize if they so wish. Minecraft has multiple servers that are MMOs that players frequently come together to enjoy. The vast amount of detail that goes into an MMO in Minecraft, such as Wynncraft for example, is simply massive thanks to the base game that it is built upon and the dedicated community. Despite being out for only a few months, Valheim has players creating incredible bases using its building mechanics. Fans have already become very creative with no signs of slowing down, and a dedicated MMO using the game's engine could be incredible.
One popular feature among many MMOs is player skills. This can range from Wood Cutting and Mining to the Club and Sword skills seen in MMOs such as Runescape, World of Warcraft, and Tibia, to name a few. These are more old-school MMOs that have player skills like these that grew as the player used them, and Valheim already features it. Much like in Tibia, when a player's character dies in Valheim, they lose a percentage of their player skills progress and drop all of their belongings. This would make PVP in a Valheim MMO more interesting as players would have some incentive to either partake or avoid PVP with a number of strangers.
Other Potential Valheim MMO Features
Valheim has some neat systems built into the base game that can be fleshed out more in an MMO setting. One such feature in Valheim is raiding, which is when waves of specific types of enemies come to assault a player's base for a time. This varies in difficulty depending on how far in the game a player has progressed but could have interesting implications if brought to a massive scale. With so many players in one Valheim server, there would no doubt be factions or guilds that players could be part of. This would inevitably lead to guild wars as players take their small armies and raid other players' villages and towns.
MMOs sometimes feature world bosses, larger-than-life creatures that require many players to participate in order to take down. Players progress in Valheim by slaying the bosses of each biome, and the bosses are usually quite a bit larger than the average enemy. It wouldn't be too far of a stretch to imagine a Valheim MMO spawning a world boss at specific places on the map, with factions of players racing to reap the rewards first. One issue that could come about in an MMO genre of this nature would be the inevitable lack of resources. If harvesting resources from the land is still a core feature of a Valheim MMO, then there will need to be some way to replenish the resources when they are depleted. Players can plant trees, though it's hard to imagine flocks of players replanting trees just as quick as they'd be chopping them down.
With a thriving mod community and an eagerly supportive player base, Valheim's success is only just beginning. The reality of a Valheim MMO isn't too far of a stretch, especially as the game seems well suited to fit into that genre with the systems it already has in place.
Valheim is available for PC.