In the closed beta of the open-world MMO Worlds Adrift (PC), it is mainly about exploring a vast, mostly player-generated game world, open PvP, and deadly storms that present their own endgame challenge.
Worlds Adrift is a sandbox MMO for PC that is currently still in closed beta.
The game world has crumbled into dozens of floating islands. The little islands now drift in the air, waiting for you to explore them with your player heroes. This, however, only works if you build an airship and set off on an adventure.
I, Jürgen, spent a good hour in Worlds Adrift with the developers from Bossa Studio, and what we experienced there, you can find out here.
Worlds Adrift – Steampunk Hipster Ahoy!
Before we get started, you create your own hero like in almost every MMO. But while games like Blade & Soul or Black Desert Online offer tons of options, in Worlds Adrift you can only choose gender, hairstyle, and clothes. That’s it!
There are no races, classes, or stats that you can adjust during character creation. Just the purely cosmetic appearance. I chose a bearded hipster with an undercut and steampunk clothing, who, thanks to the minimalist comic graphics, simply looked adorable with his big round eyes!
Worlds Adrift – My Enemy, Gravity!
Together with developer Herb Liu, we got started right after character creation. We started in a kind of tower ruin on the ground. There was no exit, just a kind of ledge many meters above us. How are we supposed to get out of there? Here comes a special feature of Worlds Adrift into play, because every hero comes standard with a grappling harpoon.
Just briefly aim at the ledge and we could ascend on the harpoon rope in the best free-climbing manner. At the top was an exit from the tower, but as the structure stands on a floating island, there was nothing but eternal emptiness yawning before us. Only a brave jump with subsequent grappling hook use could get us to the rest of the island.
While my teammate sailed through the area like a young god and, thanks to a precise grappling hook shot and optimal use of momentum, landed perfectly on the mainland, I clumsily missed the jump and fell into the abyss. I could still watch my poor little hipster fall for a while. Eventually, however, the game took pity on me and let me respawn in the tower.
Worlds Adrift – Exploring and Building
At some point, however, I got the hang of it and also managed to get to the remaining island outside the tower. There were wrecks of ships lying around everywhere. As Herb explained to me, these are half-finished construction projects from other players that were abandoned midway through building. But that shouldn’t happen to us.
Before we could build a ship, we first had to explore our island, gather resources, and accumulate the necessary knowledge by scanning trees, stones, and bushes. The scans grant knowledge points, and when you have enough, you can unlock blueprints in the menu.
So, after a short time, we had the know-how to build a small flying sloop. The building system in Worlds Adrift is completely free and allows for maximum creativity. You can freely assemble the individual components of the ship, but not everything makes sense. For example, if the steering wheel sticks vertically to the hull and the sail is protruding from the bow, the ship won’t get far.
Worlds Adrift – Off to New Worlds
The ship was finally finished, and even the sails were arranged somewhat sensibly. I took off and steered the ship from a first-person perspective to another island. Here it became evident that I had slacked off a bit during construction, as the sails were crookedly mounted, causing the wind to constantly push me off course, and I had to regularly steer against it.
Eventually, we reached another island. This one is – like almost all islands – built by players outside the game in a special editor. After an approval by the developers, the islands are then added to the game and can be explored from that point on. On the new island, we found more resources.
Additionally, someone apparently managed to awkwardly wedge their ship into a cave, forcing them to abandon it. Unfortunately, they had taken all the valuable items with them beforehand and left nothing to loot. In Worlds Adrift, there are aggressive creatures, but the main danger comes from other players due to the open PvP, who can destroy our ship and loot our stuff. Fortunately, we didn’t encounter any such pirates during our tour.
Worlds Adrift – The Eye of the Storm
If you’ve had enough of the initial islands, you can sail to remote areas at any time. However, this is not so easy, as you have to navigate through raging storm fronts. These damage your ship, and if you take too long or are not robust enough, your airship will be torn apart right beneath you. Thus, our attempt to explore new lands ended with a burning wreck and a long fall to our death.
However, the developers had finally brought in an experienced player from Worlds Adrift. Lexhy and his friends had built a gigantic airship equipped with rocket turbines, thick armor plates, and powerful cannons that fear neither storms nor pirates.
With Lexhy and his ship “Lexhyngton”, we were finally able to traverse the storm and discover islands with even richer loot behind them. Unfortunately, our time with the developers wasn’t enough to thoroughly explore this island as well.
Jürgen says: I usually don’t like sandbox MMOs, but I really enjoyed my time in Worlds Adrift with the developers. Okay, that might be because they explained everything to me right away.
On my own, I probably wouldn’t have grasped many things, such as the quite complex building mechanics, right away. And since I’m a hopeless klutz, I’ve been able to watch my character fall more than once. However, anyone who enjoys sandboxing, open PvP (of which I didn’t experience much in my session), and aerial acrobatics should definitely take a look or wait for the open beta.
If you also want to get a picture of Worlds Adrift, you can buy a founder pack on the official homepage of the developer Bossa. However, be careful, as founder packs are only available at certain times. So, it may be that you cannot currently purchase any packs.
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