NC announced (in it’s Throne and Liberty Showcase) they will be launching in South Korea next month. They will be using G-STAR 2023 (November 16-19) to showcase the game. Basically, they are just going to YOLO all of the changes they’ve announced since the KR CBT and Amazon technical test, and hope that it meets the KR player base expectations. The following showcase video itself is much more easier to digest (less of the directionless droning that was presented in the Directors Preview).
Nonetheless, the core game play loop itself hasn’t really deviated from what was presented in that preview and in the closed beta. Thus the biggest player facing changes are going to be the lack of the Astral Hunting system and the more “dynamic” combat. One HUGE red flag was the lack of content the game will be launching with. Starting at around the 15m40s mark, the director mentions the game launching with two regions which is comprised of 19 explorable territories, 8 cities, and 6 dungeons. There will be 2 arch bosses and 18 bosses. Yes, they do plan on adding content, but we’ve heard that one before. This is sort of reminiscent of the 2016 CBT where the game lacked end game content.
Basically, the gist I am getting is way too much time was spent trying to flesh out the core design after multiple iterative reboots (the original 2011 G-STAR Lineage Eternal design, the iteration that was playable in the 2016 CBT, the Project TL reboot, and now this Throne and Liberty design), where they will need to work on end game content post-launch.
The director did cover one of the most asked question starting at the 17m05s mark; what is the business model (BM)/monetization? Basically there are 4 different components; the first one are the passes which are comprised of “growth” passes (that is self-explanatory in terms of giving you items to progress your character) and the usual “battle” pass where you clear objectives over the course of a period of time (in this case, they are “special” missions every 4 weeks). As is customary, there will be the usual free track, and a purchased one that provides additional rewards comprised mostly of cosmetic items and some growth materials. Yes, you can already hear some of the groans (pay 2 progress) but this isn’t anything new. They already have a gut feeling that just cosmetics alone won’t suffice (that is unless you dedicate to putting out a lot of quality designs). To NC’s credit, they did address what happens after these passes are completed (the dead space in between) where players continue earning points that can be redeemed for rewards.
The next part of the monetization are the usual skins/cosmetics in the in-game shop. Unlike many KMMO’s, these will not have any stats. Special note was made regarding the ability to customize these cosmetics (besides just simply dyeing them, you are able to change their textures and patterns for example). Yes, NC recognizes that part of the end game for many games, is fashion wars. What we don’t know (as of this showcase video), is how extensive/granular this customization is.
The 3rd part of the monetization is of course the in-game marketplace. Seizing on the fact that having an in-game system to help facilitate trade for the games overall economy, utilization of this marketplace will require a “premium” currency known as Lucent. How akin this will be to Pheons (which are required in addition to gold for many player-to-player trades on the auction house) in Lost Ark, remains to be seen post-launch.
The final part of the monetization involves various individual products such as Amitois (pet like companions which aid in auto-looting or self-healing) or Morphs (which are the mounts that you transform into). Basically, these items were originally designated for the games original RNG loot box mechanic, but are now being made items (with fixed stats) that you can just outright purchase. The main emphasis is these cash shop items are mainly aesthetically different compared to ones that you can acquire in-game.
The next question asked was whether all of these changes, were due to the western (Amazon Games) version. Yes, it’s going to be somewhat of a sensitive topic because there is a chasm when it comes to expectations between the Asian demographic, and the western one. The director however mentioned the changes were influenced by feedback from the KR CBT, and specifically addressed the removal of Astral Hunting (auto-combat) as being performed in Korea first, and then the western version after. Note that this is just a play on the timeline since the western demographic had absolutely no official playing experience with the system beforehand (unlike the KR CBT in May which was primarily domestic focused) since it was removed for the confidential technical test that AGS ran from September 19th-October 3rd (NC publicly announced the removal of Astral Hunting on September 11th). Even though there weren’t supposed to be any non-Korean’s playing the CBT, companies like NC know the reality. Furthermore, the director did confirm they’ve also been listening to feedback from this western demographic. And there was quite a bit of noise (articles, YouTube, etc) about this auto-combat system (majority of it being negative) including myself (which I was ambivalent about). So of course, that mostly negative view did have an influence in the decision to remove it.
The director briefly covered the main changes as a result of the removal of Astral Hunting; the reduction in the grind to level along with the removal of content that was specifically meant for auto-combat (thus the content that remains is what was designed for actual manual control). This specific change (with leveling experience) represents a tenth of what it used to be (as in the May CBT) where he mentions that someone even playing only just an hour or two per day, can reach max level in about a month. Another part of the change was the rearrangement of content by taking content originally designated for the latter half of the game, to the first part (this is of course attributed to the now shorter time to level up, along with the removal of the content that was meant for auto-grinding). Again, this raises red flags regarding the lack of designed content (though the director put it in the context of the games long development, meant they had a lot of content already developed which could be moved forward). I guess the proof will be post-launch.
The next question was regarding how they managed to quickly make these combat changes (this is in reference to the slower paced/inability to move while in combat system that was in the CBT). I found his response refreshingly blunt in that they originally designed it as most KMMO’s tend to be; somewhat individualistic, free flowing (aka dynamic) and flashy, but they had to reel that back in since their design objective was to have much more purposeful strategic combat that would also contribute to larger scale combat (where this earlier free flowing flashy combat detracted from the experience they were previously shooting for). Unfortunately, that design premise didn’t translate well in actual implementation, and they heard the negative feedback from the CBT of just how bad the combat actually felt.
He was very calculated though in answering this question; he mentioned they are currently “in between these two extremes” since as expected (and what I mentioned before regarding how it is often times difficult to make such changes when something core to the base design, has to be changed), mentioned how it would normally be impossible to suddenly make changes to the combat system. Based on the closed captioned translation (which could be subject to some “lost in translation”), it sounds like they are using stopgap measures utilizing parts of each extreme, to have the combat feel more dynamic within that strict and limited combat that was part of the CBT. Thus anyone expecting TERA or BDO level of action combat, will likely find parts of this dynamic combat feeling off in some areas (post-launch will tell).
Another question asked later was why they decided on targeted combat (versus the usual action oriented non-target combat systems). Again, it relates to the above where they wanted the combat to be more structured and where situational awareness mattered. The result was the CBT combat. He did mention they don’t necessarily feel that this targeted combat makes for boring combat, but they are still working on it to make it feel more dynamic (which again, should make it clear the combat will still not be a TERA style of action combat, and that there will be limitations to how free flowing it will feel).
The remainder of the Q&A covers end game raids briefly, who the target market is (where unlike the drek that was droned on about in the earlier directors preview by multiple talking heads, was pretty much a boiler plate reply: PC MMORPG enjoyers who like a lot of different aspects of the genre). IMHO, it’s in NC’s best interest to have a Lineage based game that various player demographics can find something to enjoy that isn’t always focused on the usual end game grind of gearing, raiding, sieges, PvP. It remains to be seen if that type of environment will exist. Another and admittedly easier question he answered to was improving the UI. The main criticism from the CBT was that parts of it was too mobile-like. There was a point during this games development while it was still called Lineage Eternal, that it would also be playable on mobile (not a separate mobile version, but actually playable from mobile). That objective eventually morphed into being able to stream the game to mobile.
In a followup question (why is this being released on PC), they eventually decided to focus on PC/console because frankly speaking, mobile form factor MMO’s means there are limits to how large/dynamic that persistent game world is, and the sort of combat/skills that can be designed. This also segued into this original consideration for mobile devices including being fairly blunt that the auto-combat system was influenced by that original mobile objective. He thus confirmed that the removal of the Astral Hunting system also resulted in the change of plans for mobile (basically no longer a consideration). So I personally found this take refreshing since he acknowledged the ubiquity of mobile, but that the entire development team did not want to compromise the quality of the game (as a PC MMORPG). As for the UI, the main challenge is thus abstracting the UI for both PC and console. As Diablo IV shows, it can feel too console influenced on the PC version.
The final big part was the updates coming after launch. He confirmed two major updates including a new region that has degrees of verticality as part of its terrain, and another region which has more guild and realm vs realm type of game play where areas can be controlled. I personally make a big deal about verticality in maps because such designs lead to a lot more interesting game play including exploration. It remains to be seen just how immersive an experience they are able to create. As for the timing, he mentioned it would depend on the players demand (meaning how quickly they chew through the launch content). The timeline they are looking at internally though is 3-4 months after launch. Thus the first couple of months for the KR launch, will be critical to how well the AGS version will be received.
I’ll admit, some of his frank candor towards the end of the Q&A, has me thinking they could produce something entertaining out of this long in development hell game. I was wrong that they would not remove the core design of the game, the Astral Hunting system. But they did remove it (but it remains to be seen how the adapted changes feel in the implementation). So I think it is fair that I now give this a bit more of an open mind heading into this KR launch (even though I’ve become highly skeptical of KMMO’s releasing post 2020).
NC minted money from their mobile Lineage titles where it would be almost sacrilege for the company to have a game director directly confirm that this is no longer a consideration for this title. I realize there has been enormous pressure to get this game out of that development hell, to appease the financial press who keep asking about it, and to basically address skeptics (including myself) that this will be released and have a modicum of success. I realize they’ve been under the gun especially after signing that contract with Amazon Games since they are now on the hook with a 3rd party to deliver. I previously mentioned this was something 6-ft underground as far as anticipated titles I was looking forward to. That has sort of now changed to morbid curiosity in seeing how the KR launch plays out.
