The Asia MMORPG Black Desert has likely had a good start, can show impressive player numbers, and is expanding.
As reported by 2p, the freshly launched MMORPG Black Desert in the West broke the barrier of 100,000 concurrent players during its first weekend. The proportion of returning players is high at 80%.
It is further stated that over 500,000 players participated in the character creation event before the actual launch. The site 2p refers to statements by publisher Daum but does not provide any further sources.
@_Aethiru we are working on it, we are also increasing server capacity. Our Apologies for the hassle
— Black Desert Online (@BDO_News) March 8, 2016
Publisher Daum himself has stated via the Twitter messaging service that they are working to further increase server capacity.
While many newly launched MMORPGs experience such a surge, most recently with Blade and Soul, the peculiarity here is that Black Desert is a Buy2Play MMORPG. Most MMORPGs with such a turnout are Free2Play games. They have a much lower barrier to giving it a try.
While the characteristics of Black Desert’s AFK-friendliness could contribute to the high server load. A similar phenomenon was observed with ArcheAge.