In February 2022, after surpassing the one million player milestone, Lost Ark became the second peak online game on Steam in the west. Around the territory in the Russian Federation and the CIS, the notorious My.Games are engaged in publishing the Korean MMORPG, providing the project with complete localization and Russian-language support. We will tell you if it makes sense to break into the game now.
For isometric MMORPGs, a new era began in 2011, when NCSOFT announced Lineage Eternal, packed with innovative mechanics. Unfortunately, the challenging game never saw the light of day but set a high bar, which the Korean offices of Tripod Studio and Smilegate RPG mastered together.
Even at the testing stage, Lost Ark gained wild popularity, which multiplied with the game's release on the European market. Now Lost Ark is at the peak of development, getting new classes, continents, and raid areas, balancing existing content, and numerous Quality of life improvements. In this article, we will talk about the main features of the project and positive trends in its development.
LOST ARK HAS A GREAT PICTURE AND A DETAILED CHARACTER EDITOR
Even though Lost Ark was made on Unreal Engine 3 - the 2004 engine, the game looks much better than any modern analog of Diablo III, including the brainchild of Blizzard itself. Again, a flexible set of tools from Epic Games allowed developers to adapt the project to different generations of hardware, giving excellent optimization for less productive systems and extraordinary visuals for modern ones.
Lost Ark features a detailed techno-magical world of Acrasia with interactive environments and various biomes - from the permafrost-bound northern lands to tropical regions, floating islands, and high-tech cities. The game has carefully crafted animations and detailed detailing of characters, which, in principle, is not typical of isometric games.
Like modern Asian MMORPGs, the hero's appearance can be customized in detail and detail, changing hairstyles and makeup, calibrating facial proportions, and experimenting with a palette of skin, eye, and hair colors. According to the law of the genre, female characters look incredibly impressive, but they correspond to the general concept of the world.
One annoyance is that the sex of some classes is still predetermined, but the developers are gradually removing gender restrictions and even endowing heterosexual heroes with unique properties. For example, at the beginning of last year, a female version of the demon hunter appeared in the game, and by the end of 2022, players can expect the appearance of a female berserker in Lost Ark.
LOST ARK HAS A WIDE VARIETY OF ARCHETYPES, AND THEIR NUMBER CONTINUES TO GROW
The following types of characters are represented in Lost Ark: monks, warriors, shooters, magicians, and assassins. And don't be embarrassed that there are only five classes - each of them has several archetypes in the game with their own sets of abilities, mechanics, and weapons, not to mention the variety of builds for each.
So, in the ranks of warriors, classic berserkers with massive two-handed weapons, zealots of the light paladins, tanks-guards fight, among wizards, summoners, minstrel supports, and battlemages, monks and archers have five subspecies, and assassins have three.
At the time of writing, twenty-one unique archetypes have been implemented in Lost Ark. Since the launch, the Fury, Paladin, Scout Agent, Reaper, Enchantress, Death Blade, Demon Hunter, and Tygon have been added to the game, and this is far from the limit.
The unique combat system of Lost Ark forces the player to master each archetype separately, carefully selecting sets of skills and power-ups for them, some of which can improve specific skill effects while others completely reshape their mechanics. The user can use up to eight skills in a combo, use them in conjunction with the ultimate abilities of the archetypes, rely on mobility and speed, support, or an aggressive, offensive game.
THERE ARE A LOT OF ACTIVITIES IN THE LOST ARK
No matter how some portals praise lore games, I don't consider the plot component a strong point of Lost Ark - me. The story here is rather plain. Still, it will take players to all corners of the world, send them to explore dungeons, encounter dangerous bosses, teach them how to search for secrets, and help choose the vector of development of the hero.
At the endgame stage, life in Lost Ark is just beginning: players will be able to join the hunt for powerful bosses or collect collectible rewards, prepare and test their character in raids, participate in numerous events, daily and weekly events, mine Lost Ark gold, explore new continents, halls, rifts and islands of adventure.
Fans of PVP content won't lose out either: the game features arenas, stadiums, and even a royal battle mode. Memorable ranked matches will allow you to participate in seasonal challenges. There are even PVP guild brawls where clans compete in combat and non-combat competitions.
By the way, PVP in the game is praised for a reasonably good class balance, a low entry threshold, and the ability to create an individual set of skills and characteristics for battles with other players so as not to travel with a PVP built through PVE content. You must note that the developers also often polish and bring the aggressive portion to thought.
CARD GAMES, PRIVATE ESTATE, MARINE CONTENT
One of the most attractive features of Lost Ark is the growing variety of diverse activities. Like the once-innovative Black Desert and ArcheAge, the developers of Lost Ark have implemented full-fledged marine content in the game with many small islands, treasures, pirate ships, and separate events on the water.
Players build and fortify their ships for dangerous waters, hire crews of sailors, and fight and search wrecks for underwater riches. The navigation system constantly improves, adding new areas with objects of interest, opponents, and particular types of currencies and getting creative with tasks. If initially, the content was very amateurish, now, more and more players are willing to set sail.
In early 2020, with the Silmael update, a new PVE mode of card battles appeared in the game. The inhabitants of Lost Ark mine rare cards and collect battle decks from dueling with other players or AI. The game rewards the champion with achievements and rare items to help in character development.
In update 2.0, an island with a private estate, merchants, and a ranch for pets appeared in the game. It contains a laboratory where players research improvements for their possessions, a workshop for crafting consumables, a naval headquarters for equipping ships for maritime missions, and the mansion itself, where you can change heroes' outfits and decorate the estate.
LOST ARK IS CONSTANTLY EVOLVING
The developers of Lost Ark keep a close eye on the players' reactions and successfully work with criticism. So, with each large-scale update in the game, the endgame expands, and the difficulty of reaching it is eliminated. Furthermore, the game features a "legacy" procedure that permits you to strengthen and equip all the heroes in your account to make sure it would be less complicated for gamers to deliver new characters for your present information.
The lack of gold is the main obstacle to development in the late stages of the game, but the number of ways to get it continues to grow. You will have to grind in any case, and quite a lot, this is still a Korean MMO, but there are more and more options for profitable activities, including regular events.
On April 20, the Esdo Power update will be released in the Russian version of Lost Ark, which will add a new heroic raid, another guardian, equipment of unique Quality, and a special Esdo weapon to the game. The Russian version of the game can be downloaded from the official My.Games website. The European version of Lost Ark is available on Steam, but not for our audience.
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