Summary
Following the cancelation of its short-lived hero shooterCrucible,New Worldwas Amazon’s first proper foray into the AAA video game market. As a buy-to-play MMORPG and a new IP from a publisher without an extensive track record, it was no exaggeration to say thatNew Worldfaced stiff competition from other games of its kind leading up to its 2021 release. Despite that, though, the game ended up being a massive hit upon its launch, with the MMORPG reaching over 900k concurrent players on Steam in October 2021. The success ofNew Worldwas short-lived, however, as the title declined in popularity dramatically over the ensuing months, in large part due to many criticisms of the game being left unaddressed by the developers.
Despitedecreased interest in the game, Amazon has remained committed to supportingNew Worldfor the long term. The company even announced during Summer Game Fest 2024 that it’d bebringing its debut MMORPG to PlayStation 5 and Xbox Series X/Sunder the titleNew World: Aeternum. While the name change might seem strange at first, there is a reason for it, becauseNew World:Aeternumisn’t just a simple console port. Rather, it’s more of a relaunch for the game as a whole, since it enhances a number of features from the original title.New World: Aeternumhas the potential to breathe new life into theonce-popular MMORPG, but if Amazon wants to make sure that this relaunch ends up being a success, it needs to avoid the many mistakes Blizzard made with its launch ofOverwatch 2.
New World: Aeternum Needs to Avoid Making the Same Mistakes that Overwatch 2 Made
Blizzard Fumbled the Bag With Overwatch 2’s Launch
WhenOverwatch 2was first announced at BlizzCon 2019, it was met with a mixed reception from the gaming community, as its existence indicated that support for the originalOverwatchwould soon wind down. Nonetheless, some Blizzard fans were very excited about the prospect of a sequel to the immensely successful hero shooterbecause it was meant to include new, story-based PvE modes, among other things.
Overwatch 2was finally released in early access across all modern platforms in October 2022, but the promised PvE modes were nowhere to be found. At the time, Blizzard claimed that this major feature would be added at a later date following the game’s initial launch. But as the months passed,Overwatch 2’s planned PvE componentwas hit with delay after delay until, eventually, the developer announced that it was scrapping the promised mode entirely.
As one might expect, theOverwatch 2community didn’t take this cancelation lightly. This was understandable, considering the fact that Blizzard had essentially shelved the one defining feature of the hero shooter that justified its existence as a sequel. This incident, combined withBlizzard’s recent decision to bring 6v6 back to the game, has effectively made the “2” inOverwatch 2’s name superfluous.
Amazon Should Use Overwatch 2 as an Example of What Not to Do with New World: Aeternum
Since both titles could be considered relaunches, there’s a lot thatNew World: Aeternumcould learn from Blizzard’s poor handling ofOverwatch 2. Most importantly, though, this new version of Amazon’s MMORPG needs to avoid being too similar to the game that came before it. IfNew World: Aeternumis basically the same game as the 2021 original and addresses only a few of the complaints from the base release, then it could end up suffering fromthe same issues thatOverwatch 2facedwhen it came out last year and thus fail to gain traction.
Fortunately, from what Amazon has shared aboutNew World: Aeternumso far, it does seem like it’s going to avoid falling into the same potholes thatOverwatch 2did, as the title will apparently featurea number of new improvements to New World’s base game, from the leveling and dialogue system being improved to new character archetypes and end-game solo trials being added. Ultimately, though, the long-term success of the MMORPG hinges on the quality of said changes and how significant they are. If these additions don’t improve the core experience that much, thenNew World: Aeternummay fail to attract a wider audience, despite its release on additional platforms.
