New World Review After 100 Hours, Or: Why Have I Cut Down 15,000 Trees?

New World is an entrancing game at its best, and an absolute soulless grind at its worst. Here’s our 100 hour New World review.

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Birds start chirping outside – or is it coming from my headset? It’s sort of hard to tell when you’re as entranced by New World as I am. My flatmate asks me what I’m doing: “Harry, why are you still playing this game? Whenever I look at the screen you’re just running through the same woods over and over again.” I turn and give him a gormless smile. I can’t explain. This is a review, though, so I suppose I’ll try.

New World is a game that hooks you – if you’re open to being hooked. It’s a bit like if the 17th century sailors from New World got sidetracked and happened upon an island with some strange, very tasty plants. They could leave, but it’s pretty comfy on the island, and everything is suddenly turning purple. It is atmospherically intoxicating from the moment you start playing. Lush grass as far as you can see. Wild boars stumble out of the shade. Light filters through the trees. This is an MMO like I’ve never seen (or heard) before.

Despite this novel feeling, there is much about New World that feels familiar. That’s not a bad thing. There is something oddly comforting about cutting down trees for four hours, a sort of brilliant pointlessness. I never realised that’s what I wanted from a new MMO, but apparently it is. Two million other players apparently wanted it, too.

I always get this warm feeling watching new players rush into Aeternum, like I’ve been transported back ten years to a late-night grind with a Fanta and a bag of Haribo. We’re all in this together, and that in and of itself was enough to get me through the first 15 hours of the game. That’s not to say New World only appeals to those nostalgic for genre classics like Runescape or Everquest. The experience is the same for first-timers and veterans alike. It is, in many ways, the perfect starter MMO.

I’m carried through the next 60 hours by the people around me. New World is designed as a social experience. There are factions to join, companies to run, and territories to battle over. Intriguing internal politics have already broken out on my server: the weakest group, the Marauders, have formed an alliance with the Covenant, the second strongest. Together, they intend to take on the Syndicate, the most powerful faction on the entire server. It promotes organic storytelling in a way that few games do.

With such intrigue comes inevitable violence. PvP is the most defining factor of New World. I recently wrote in detail about how PvP is the game’s best quality, but to summarize: just turn your PvP flag on when you play, yeah? The emergent fights that break out in the wild make simple tasks, like mining for iron ore or chopping down trees, about seven thousand times more interesting. You might get snuck up on by three Purple bastards while cutting down a tree, but that’s just part of the game.

In fact, “That’s just part of the game” has become something of a popular quote on my faction’s Discord server. There’s so much about New World that is totally, completely, definitely broken. To cover all these problems here would take the next 60 minutes of your life, so here they are at a machine gun pace:

The majority of endgame content doesn’t work. It’s been two weeks since launch and it’s all still busted. Dozens of the gems are bugged and don’t perform as intended. Textures go missing regularly. The endgame grind is endless, tedious, and uninspired. There is so much of the game that feels designed to waste your time. Much of the economy is a disaster. One faction typically dominates the server (usually the most toxic one, filled with the worst people in global chat.) Outpost Rush, the late-game PvP mode, also doesn’t work. There’s even a bug that makes you totally invincible right now. Leveling solo in the late game is basically impossible. The trading house UI is terrible.

And the premise, wow, the premise. It couldn’t get much more “Amazon” if you were writing a social satire piece. New World has a silly, stupid premise. It really is awful. Set vaguely in the 17th century, you play as a washed-up sailor on the magical island of Aeternum, a place that pillagers and (yes, really) colonisers have fought over for hundreds of years. You spend the next few hours deforesting the island, wiping out its wildlife, and killing the inhabitants, which are (yes, really) zombies. The game is blasé about its political stance. Any potential to challenge or comment on this loaded history is (yes, really) completely overlooked.

So with dozens of serious problems and a political premise that is questionable at absolute best, why have I and hundreds of thousands of others dedicated so much time to New World? Because it is pointless and gorgeous. I will reiterate again: there is so much here that is completely broken. Do not purchase this game if you want a flawless experience. And yet…

There is no other way to explain it other than an all-encompassing “One more iron ore, one more dungeon run.” I’m a sucker for it. I can’t help it. I am continually swept away by the tide of grinding, progression, experience bars, little chats here and there with strangers, battles over iron ore, faction skirmishers, putting a new stove in my house, and finally hitting level 60. I am a sailor slumped on a beach huffing on a bright pink flower. My flatmate says, bleary-eyed, “Go to bed. It’s daytime outside and those trees aren’t real.”

3.5 outta 5 – I have a job, New World, please.

New World is playable on PC via Steam.

Link Source : https://www.thegamer.com/new-world-review-100-hours/