It’s difficult to break through in the popular MMORPG scene, with stalwarts like Final Fantasy XIV, World of Warcraft, Elder Scrolls Online and others still going strong to this day, with large player bases. Still, Amazon seems determined to cement itself as a strong contender in its own right, with New World releasing back in 2021, and the recent polished fun of Throne and Liberty coming in hot. Now, New World is back with New World: Aeternum… not that it ever really left in the first place.
In our initial review of New World back when it launched, we said: “Amazon’s new foray into the world of massively multiplayer role-playing is a tentative success. There’s the core of a really phenomenal experience here that with continuous love and attention can blossom into an experience worthy of standing the test of time.” Well, with New World: Aeternum now hitting console for the first time and continuing to improve the experience for existing PC players, so far, it’s still proving to last.
What New World: Aeternum sets out to do is present a more streamlined and slick experience for new players in particular. For all of the positive things we had to say about New World three years ago, its early content petered out relatively quickly, the levelling journey was a bit repetitive, and the large faction-based endgame activity didn’t have enough juice to properly sustain it. New World loyalists will tell you that it’s been a bumpy road since then. With updates proving to be very hit-and-miss, New World has been in a cycle of building momentum and then swiftly losing it. Aeternum is hoping to break that mould.
For PC players, it’s a case of the same game, with a different name. It’s an interesting strategy to present it as something entirely different and new for the console market; for existing PC folk, it’s a free patch, but for Xbox and PlayStation players keen to dive in, it’s the cost of a full-price retail release. It’s a bold move, considering Amazon themselves just came out with the free-to-play and bloody good Throne and Liberty, but it’s the same model that New World has always had, to be fair.
“…Aeternum has a more fleshed-out story, a clear pathway through its main questline that wasn’t really there before, and a lot of other new content and quality-of-life features.”
Pitched as a “spiritual successor” to New World, Aeternum has a more fleshed-out story, a clear pathway through its main questline that wasn’t really there before, and a lot of other new content and quality-of-life features. There’s even a whole bunch of new cinematics to really make the experience feel grandiose, which is a nice touch. Playing alongside a previous PC New World player, he mentioned that the difference feels complete night and day. He’s seen all the changes, good and bad, since the very start, and noted that the current journey of levelling through the story content is the best it’s ever been. From the 20-ish hours I’ve put in myself, that rings true. The 17th-century pirate-faring adventure carefully guides you along from quest to quest, and the progression feels good. It’s easy to dive in and lose countless hours as you get that sweet MMORPG ding feeling, levelling up, getting stronger, exploring new parts of the map, and loot just begging to be found.
New World: Aeternum wants to be more of an action RPG than an MMORPG, but it now feels like a Frankensteining of both. That’s not necessarily a bad thing; combat has been streamlined, and still feels satisfying, although only three abilities to be used at any given time on a weapon does feel somewhat limiting. You can switch weapons on the fly, and the more you use them, the more skill points you’ll get to upgrade those abilities. That said, while battling is fun enough, it’s not quite the parry/dodge-heavy action RPG that it wants to be. Enemies will run towards you when aggroed, then you’ll trigger your various abilities and watch their health bars go down. Stronger foes do require you to block and dodge a little bit, but it’s mostly a numbers game like any MMORPG you’ve played in recent memory.
To continue fostering the idea of newcomers having an easier time coming to grips with the game’s various systems, Aeternum also offers seven character archetypes from the jump. They range from the devastating tank-like Destroyer or berserker-style Swordbearer to support-based magic classes like Mystic and Occultist. You can change them at any point, so you’re certainly not locked in, but whichever archetype you pick will be supported with relevant rewards for that archetype in the earlier parts of the experience, making it far more palatable while you’re learning and growing.
The co-op experience remains seamless and can be done across platforms on the same shared servers. I’ve spent all of my time in Aeternum playing alongside my mate, and the process of questing together, traversing gorgeous settings and taking down baddies is a lot of fun. Like the best in the genre, it’s incredibly easy to lose hours to New World: Aeternum made much easier by the mount you acquire at level 20 (another hard pill to swallow after the morph-mount system in Throne and Liberty, but I digress). As somebody who played three years back and hasn’t really ventured here since, it’s nice to return, and I was quickly reminded of how slick and gratifying New World is, at its very core, its mix of questing and crafting making for a tantalising gameplay loop.
As a console player this time round, they’ve done a reasonable job of bringing the game to a controller without any obvious problems. Navigating menus with the cursor isn’t the most elegant decision, but it’s fine for what it is; there are also some decent combat action optimisations, like Target Locking, Aim Assist and Smart Cast, that mean you can enjoy fighting foes without fumbling around with too many systems to think about at once. Moving forward, Amazon has promised that consoles will have the same features and future updates that their PC counterpart will have, so if you haven’t tried it until now, the console version is certainly a viable way to jump in without much compromise.
Beyond that, improvements and additions have been made, with new end-game expeditions and mutations, new weapons, and other quality-of-life improvements. It does feel more polished than ever and with more stuff than ever before. It also includes the Rise of the Angry Earth expansion, so jumping in today makes New World: Aeternum feel richer with content instantly, something that was sorely lacking when it was originally released.
For those particularly keen to keep playing well into the end-game, there’s a large-scale PVP zone, 10-player raids and even solo trial challenges. While I haven’t personally gotten far enough to dive into them in detail, the team promise a “really fresh and exciting experience“, so here’s hoping it impresses those who have been committed since day one.
So where does that all leave New World: Aeternum, at the end of the day? In some ways, it does feel like a generous glow-up of the New World that launched in 2021; if you’re an existing PC player, jumping in with a new character will get you a far more pleasant experience than you’ve had prior, and that makes for a sweet-spot entry point for console owners. Revamped with console and controller in mind, New World: Aeternum is right up there as one of the best optimised and satisfying console MMORPGs available, and it’s smart to try and crack that market.
That said, a full price tag is a tough pill to swallow, when there are plenty of free competitors on the market (or, some available on platforms like Xbox Game Pass, too). New World: Aeternum makes a strong case for merging action RPG sensibilities with the MMORPG genre, and its high production values are eye-catching, with a gorgeous soundtrack backing it up. Fans are hesitant, and rightly so; while this promises to be the revamp they’ve always wanted, the proof will once again be in the long-term pudding as to whether the ongoing support, balancing, tweaking and new content in the future will be enough.
For now, New World: Aeternum is a lot of fun; a hassle-free, newbie-friendly MMORPG experience with a neat setting and some genuinely cool ideas. At this point, it will absolutely survive – I just hope it thrives, as well.
New World: Aeternum is available now on PC, Xbox Series X and PS5.
About the Author
Luke Mitchell
he/him
Luke spends his time making radio, playing video games, binge-watching TV, getting unreasonably invested in wrestling, hosting bear events and hanging out with his beautiful pets.
