Transparency is a trait that can be hard to find amongst game developers, but it looks like Smilegate and Amazon Games understand its importance. In a lengthy new blog post on the official Lost Ark blog, the dev team is addressing players and offering a look behind the curtain at what’s to come. The team also addresses the issues surrounding botting and scarce materials.
A large number of the game’s players have progressed through Lost Ark‘s Tier 1 and Tier 2 content at their own pace, which the post confirms is the right way to play–upon release in other regions, Tier 3 did not yet exist. Tier 3 is more of an endgame point, in which players who have mastered the game’s mechanics can find better loot and more challenging fights. Earlier this month, however, the Abyss Raid Argos was released, requiring a very hard-to-get item that only players with a lot of time or money could reach. This instantly made players feel as though Lost Ark was pay-to-win.
“We made a mistake releasing the March game update too quickly after launch. Data we analyzed alongside Smilegate RPG from their previous launches projected that a larger portion of players would have reached the level required to challenge Argos,” the post reads. “However, we overlooked certain variables, such as players spending more time on horizontal content and the price of honing materials increasing due to bots and real-money transactions. These factors contributed to a scarcity of T3 honing materials. Together, our teams at Amazon Games and Smilegate RPG are continuing to gather data on play patterns in the western version to better inform our future content roadmap.”
The current shortage of Tier 3 materials is causing problems, so the dev team is adding more pre-existing material sources and new, easier events.
Kindly, the blog post ends with a gift. Players in Korea recieved a gift bundle to celebrate Lost Ark‘s launch in the west, and that bundle will be sent to western players next week. It includes:
- New Animal Skin Selection Chest
- Mokokon Pet Selection Chest
- Moko-board Mount Selection Chest
- Lost Ark United Structure
- Appearance Change Ticket
- Pheons x132
- Menelik’s Tome x5
- Legendary Card Pack Selection Chest x2
- Jukebox songs that will be provided when Jukebox content is released in the future.
Read the full blog post here.
Lost Ark was fully released in its free-to-play format on February 11, 2021. On March 8, it was announced that the title had surpassed 20 million players worldwide.
