Amazon will place a strong focus on housing in its upcoming MMO New World – this was revealed by Game Director Scot Lane in an interview with our editor Leya Jankowski.
During the Game Awards 2019, Amazon officially announced the release of the MMO New World. On this occasion, we conducted an interview with Game Director Scot Lane at MeinMMO, who told us a lot about housing.
We wondered what content the MMO would offer for players who are not particularly interested in combat and intense mass battles, which will be an important part of the game.
A feature we believe players will have a lot of fun with is our housing. Every settlement has houses that you can buy. You can decorate the house and the garden. You can find or craft furniture out in the world. This will be a key component of PvE in the open world.
Imagine you want to fight a wolf, you find one and kill it. You can hang the fur on your wall, and when you have that wolf in your house, you will receive a buff when you fight against beasts.
So we have cosmetic and functional furniture.
Scot Lane, Game Director of New World about housing to MeinMMO
Scot explained that housing will create its own gameplay loop. Even in their early testing phases, players are said to have already experimented and come up with some pretty cool decorations.
Meanwhile, the developers have already released official information. All information about housing in New World can be found in our special.
Why is housing particularly exciting?
If all this is true, then the housing will be as extensive and good as we haven’t seen in a long time in a western MMO.
To summarize the housing of New World:
- You can buy houses in a settlement
- both house and garden are customizable
- you can find decorations for the house in the world
- it is possible to craft decorations yourself
- there are functional decorations that grant you buffs
- Politics plays a role, as the ruler of a settlement determines things like taxes
This will all be in the game from the start, according to the developers. Other games like Final Fantasy XIV or ESO also have extensive housing, but it was added to the games later. Currently, there are really only a few exceptions like Maple Story 2, where housing plays an important and central role.
Individual elements, as they are now supposed to exist in New World, can also be found elsewhere. The combination is what makes it innovative and exciting.
What’s behind it: The special thing here is that we learned about housing from Scot only because we asked for content for casual players and PvE.
A “casual” player is someone who does not invest much time to fully enjoy a game. They approach a game more casually and might not keep up with others even in the endgame.
That Scot mentioned housing so prominently and first is telling. It suggests how significant Amazon wants this feature to be in the game.
However, this is a personal interpretation from the conversation. Also, there are currently no images or videos of housing.
Scot further mentioned that they still have some ideas in the team on how to add more fun elements if players desire it.
The current planned launch with housing could therefore still expand from here. Housing already seems to be extensively designed.
If all this is true and implemented, then New World could once again come out with an MMO from the West where housing plays a central role.
New World has a new direction
What has happened to New World? Originally, New World was planned as a survival sandbox game. The game was supposed to have forced PvP and a strong PvP focus. However, that has since changed.
New World is now going to be an open-world MMO, with the option to turn PvP on and off. Overall, more PvE content has been added, such as NPC quests and missions that encourage exploration of the world.
Also, the story has moved away from American colonization and is leaning more towards dark fantasy.
The developers decided to redesign the MMO based on feedback from their alpha testing.
Here you will find more parts from our interview with Scot Lane:
