The latest New World alpha update introduces the great axe, and update to shields, and a large swath of changes to combat. You can glean a lot about Amazon Game Studios’ direction from the update notes, much of which was directed by player feedback.
The December Alpha Update also points to a combat blog post that outlines the developer’s vision for combat, based around three design pillars:
- SKILL-BASED, ACTION-ORIENTED
- VISCERAL AND HIGH-IMPACT
- DEPTH OF SYSTEM AND BUILDS
By following this outline of how they expect combat to perform, and how players can utilize an in-depth system for build diversity, AGS believes they’ll be able to surpass combat in its current state and make something truly satisfying.
In the latest patch, revamping aspects of combat, such as stunlocks from light attack spam, or being easily interrupted, just wasn’t fun, so the update set out to change things to make the game more enjoyable, and streamline systems that were too cumbersome, such as healing.
In the November update, players were introduced to Reekwater. If you happened to miss it, you may also want to check out our impressions on Reekwater, and what you may come to expect from other areas of the game.
