Since my article two weeks ago discussing the issues revolving around the 1.0 patch a few things have happened. ArcheAge in Russia entered their open beta on February 22nd allowing for even more people to get their hands on the game. The launch of this version has led to several English communities forming in a few different servers with a popular one being Nova. In the process players are of course dealing with large queues as long as a few hours to get into a server. To reduce the influx of players on so few servers since launch, XLGAMES has added a few new servers (Russian).
Although that's not all that has occurred since then: on February 21st, just before the Russian open beta kicked off, we got a blog post from Trion Worlds. It basically says "Hey, we've been listening to everyone's feedback on the 1.0 patch among anything else you've been saying." They made their way out to Korea to meet with the ArcheAge team at XLGAMES to truly make a high quality westernization of ArcheAge. Because no one here seems to want what we've been hearing has become of AA in Korean over the last few weeks! Specifically in the blog they state, “Both of us (Trion and XLGAMES) feel that it’s vitally important to continue highlighting and improving the sandbox elements that make ArcheAge a unique, standout winner here in the west.”
While the blog post mainly states that they're listening, it's not very specific. But it's there to try and keep the community in the loop which is good to see without a doubt, however vague. Also stated in the blog is that they'll be at the Game Developer Conference taking place March 17th to 21st. As press will be able to demo the westernized version, we'll start seeing immensely more coverage on it and how the transition has been. Make sure to also keep your ear to the ground for when GDC kicks off, as the blog also mentions, “[GDC] will officially begin the drumbeat to beta and beyond.” While this only says so much, who knows? We may hear a bit more regarding the beta, even if it's only an idea of when.
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Aside from the blog, I have one more thing to discuss regarding ArcheAge's development. The day the Russian version of ArcheAge launched the website MMOZG.net posted an interview with Jake Song, CEO of XLGAMES.
The interview is also unfortunately a big vague as the interviewer's were only given a short period to discuss ArcheAge with Jake Song. What players from the ArcheAge community and ArcheAge Source will be glad to hear is that it frequently focused on the sandbox elements that have been slowly disappearing. A simple question like, “Which is your favorite part - from the gamer's point of view?” led to an answer of farming. Unfortunately we all still know about the labor potion discussed in the last column.
Taking part of a question asked by MMOZG.net, “So what's the general direction of ArcheAge development? More theme park or more sandbox?”, a question many are certainly wondering.“We still think sandbox elements are important for ArcheAge. But we have the feeling that theme park elements in Archeage are far from being perfect so they were addressed first. It was done in the last patch. But we still believe sandbox elements are very important for ArcheAge.” Jake Song responded.
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This response can even run back to the blog from Trion Worlds in which they mentioned that you can basically be a sky pirate if you so choose. All you have to do is craft a “kickass glider” and ambush airships or take to the other side and protect traveling merchants.
The rest of the interview is fairly basic information based on the time slot they were provided. While we haven't heard from Trion Worlds or XL Games picking at specific features and this may be coming to the western version while this won't, There has been more communication in the last week than previously. I'm hopeful that the gates of info are about to open.
Keep talking Trion and we'll continue to listen, just make sure to discuss what's really eating at the community.
