New World, Amazon Games’ Age of Exploration MMO, arrives in May

By Gabe Gurwin December 12, 2019

Amazon New World MMO — Amazon

Amazon Games’ hasn’t exactly seen much fruits of its development labor thus far, but that will change next May with the release of its MMO New World. The news was revealed during The Game Awards on December 12, and it represents the biggest step yet for an Amazon venture that has remained surprisingly underground since its inception several years ago.

New World is set during the 17th century in the Age of Exploration, with magical and haunted elements on an island called Aeternum. You’ll go up against enemies on the island, including fellow players as well as the local “legions,” and you’ll have the opportunity to craft your experience as you see fit.

Amazon Games is building New World as a large-scale adventure with enormous battles between players, and there will be up to 100 players fighting at once in special fortress siege battles. You will not be using MMO-style combat like we see in games such as World of Warcraft, but something that offers a little more direct control, and both solo and team-oriented players will be able to forge a path and thrive in the game. Despite taking a new approach to the genre, the game’s development team is made up of veterans from several online games, including World of Warcraft and Everquest.

Amazon New World MMO — Amazon

“Our team has been working tirelessly to create a deep, immersive world that delivers challenges and surprises at every turn, and we’re so excited to reveal a bit more of it today,” Amazon Games vice president Christoph Hartmann said in the announcement.

New World will release in May 2020, with a beta taking place in April. You can pre-order the game through its official website, and those who pre-order will be given access to the beta as well as a special amulet, emote, guild crest set, and unique Expedition One title. It’s launching via Steam, so it appears any potentially rumored streaming service Amazon is planning to launch will not be ready before the game’s release date. We previously spoke to the game’s creators about how it’s making use of Amazon’s cloud services to aid in development and scale. A Lord of the Rings online game is also in the works.

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Gabe Gurwin has been playing games since 1997, beginning with the N64 and the Super Nintendo. He began his journalism career…

Gaming

Amazon’s New World team is making a The Lord of the Rings MMO

Morfyyd Clark in "The Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power."

Amazon Games Orange County, the development team behind New World, announced that it is making a The Lord of the Rings MMO for PC and consoles.
This game was made possible thanks to a deal between Amazon and the Embracer Group-owned Freemode, which is the parent company of The Lord of the Rings stewards Middle-Earth Enterprises. This isn't the first time Amazon and Embracer Group have partnered either, as Amazon Games is set to publish the next Tomb Raider game from Embracer-owned studio Crystal Dynamics. This also isn't Amazon's first attempt at making a multiplayer game based on The Lord of the Rings.
Previously, it collaborated with the Chinese company Leyou on an MMO set in this world, but it was canceled after Leyou got acquired by Tencent. Now, with Middle-Earth Enterprises under new ownership, which Amazon just so happens to be friendly with, it has become possible for Amazon to make a multiplayer game based on The Lord of the Rings once again.

Amazon describes its upcoming The Lord of the Rings game as "an open-world MMO adventure in a persistent world set in Middle-earth, featuring the beloved stories of The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings literary trilogy." This game seems to fall in line with the string of MMOs that Amazon has been behind lately, which includes New World, Lost Ark, and upcoming titles Blue Protocol and Throne and Liberty. It is unrelated to The Rings of Power, the big-budget television show that Amazon Studios produces.
As the game is in "the early stages of production," according to Amazon, we don't yet have a release window for it. In the meantime, there are going to be a lot of other games based on The Lord of the Rings to play, including EA's mobile game The Lord of the Rings: Heroes of Middle-Earth and Daedelic Entertainment's action-adventure game about Gollum.

Gaming

Move over, Wordle: The New York Times has a new puzzle game

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The New York Times has introduced the next title coming to its Games catalog following Wordle's continued success -- and it's all about math. Digits has players adding, subtracting, multiplying, and dividing numbers. You can play its beta for free online right now.
In Digits, players are presented with a target number that they need to match. Players are given six numbers and have the ability to add, subtract, multiply, or divide them to get as close to the target as they can. Not every number needs to be used, though, so this game should put your math skills to the test as you combine numbers and try to make the right equations to get as close to the target number as possible.

Players will get a five-star rating if they match the target number exactly, a three-star rating if they get within 10 of the target, and a one-star rating if they can get within 25 of the target number. Currently, players are also able to access five different puzzles with increasingly larger numbers as well. I solved today's puzzle and found it to be an enjoyable number-based game that should appeal to inquisitive minds that like puzzle games such as Threes or other The New York Times titles like Wordle and Spelling Bee.
In an article unveiling Digits and detailing The New York Time Games team's process to game development, The Times says the team will use this free beta to fix bugs and assess if it's worth moving into a more active development phase "where the game is coded and the designs are finalized." So play Digits while you can, as The New York Times may move on from the project if it doesn't get the response it is hoping for.
Digits' beta is available to play for free now on The New York Times Games' website

Gaming

Amazon repeats its Lost Ark playbook to bring another international MMO to the West

A cloaked character stares out at a village in Throne and Liberty.

Amazon Games announced today that it will publish NCSoft's fantasy MMORPG Throne and Liberty in North America, South America, Europe, and Japan. This cements a unique niche that Amazon Games has found for itself as a publisher: bringing Asian MMOs to the west.
[NCing] THRONE AND LIBERTY - Official Trailer | Work in Progress | 엔씨소프트
Throne and Liberty is an ambitious MMO in development that includes fast-paced action combat, features large-scale PvE and PvP battles, and lets players transform into different creatures and control the environment during battles. The game has been in development for several years, but we didn't know if it'd get a Western release until now. With Amazon's backing, Throne and Liberty will now come out for PC, PlayStation 5, and Xbox Series X in the West with full cross-play support.

While MMO fans will be happy at this announcement, this also demonstrates that Amazon Games has found a niche for itself as a game publisher by bringing Eastern MMOs to the West. For years, Amazon struggled to gain solid footing as a game developer and publisher, with multiple games canceled and titles like Crucible failing to gain traction. While MMOs aren't as popular as they used to be, Amazon has found a successful niche in trying to make the genre thrive again. It released New World to somewhat positive success, but really found a hit with the release of Lost Ark in February 2022.
Now, it's backing Bandai Namco's Blue Protocol and NCSoft's Throne and Liberty in hopes of repeating this success. Amazon Games Vice Preisident Christoph Hartmann explained what makes these kinds of games appealing in a press release.
"Publishing games that live and grow over time remains a critical piece of our strategy, and delivering games of the highest quality from the world’s most talented developers is one of the cornerstones of our business," Hartmann writes. "The last year has taught us a great deal about publishing and managing a successful live-service game on a global scale, and we’re ready to bring Throne and Liberty players an incredible experience at launch."
It remains to be seen if either of those games will reach Lost Ark's level of success and if Amazon Games plans to do this with even more Eastern MMOs. Outside of the MMO space, Amazon Games will also be publishing the next Tomb Raider game.