Lost Ark

Lost Ark brings you to the world of Arkesia, a land fraught with chaos. Join the race to rediscover the Lost Ark before demonic forces can plunge the world into another era of darkness. In Lost Ark, you will travel across the land in search of the seven pieces of the Ark. However, this is no easy task. Nor is it a short one. Some true dedication is needed to keep Arkesia safe.

However, you are not alone. You will travel alongside many other players, as is typical in an MMO. You will also be joined by a host of NPCs to aid you along your way. Lost Ark is full of memorable locations and people that make the world feel alive. Diverse regions, accompanied by appropriate musical styles, keep the gameplay interesting. As does Lost Ark’s combat system, which plays well with each of the 15 different classes.

Take a look for yourself:

Play Your Way

Lost Ark gives you quite the loadout for character selections. Five main classes – Warrior, Martial Artist, Gunner, Mage, & Assassin – each have a unique set of sub-classes. These sub-classes allow you to dial in on your fighting style.

For example, the Gunner class has four options: the Gunslinger, the Artillerist, the Deadeye, and the Sharpshooter. The Deadeye (my preference) allows you to switch between a rifle, shotgun, and pistols. They are also pretty quick on their feet. They can fire from afar with the rifle, get in close to do some damage with the shotgun, and quickly hop away again to safety. The Artillerist, on the other hand, is much slower but also hits harder.

The difference in class styles is typical of most MMOs. There isn’t much special in selecting your class. Lost Ark makes every class just as interesting as the others. And they are all fun to play. However, Lost Ark does stand out from the crowd some with the use of their Tripod system.

Lost Ark’s Tripod system is a part of the combat skill progression. When you level up, you are awarded skill points. These points are then used to level up individual abilities. When these abilities reach a certain level, you can select a buff or new effect to accompany that ability. For example, there is a Deadeye ability that kicks the enemy into the air before firing at them in rapid succession. When this ability is leveled up, instead of kicking them into the air, you can choose to paralyze the enemy. When the character reaches a certain Combat Level, new abilities are unlocked. These can be added to your repertoire and upgraded in the same fashion.

The best part of the Tripod system is that you can change anything at any time. You can decide to respec your abilities to try something new. There is also no kind of cost associated with doing this, as some other games include. Lost Ark also gives you the ability to set different presets for your selections. This means you can play around with different combinations of abilities or buffs at any time and find what works best for you.

Lost Ark is incredibly combat-heavy, but that isn’t a bad thing. The developers designed a wonderful system that keeps combat interesting. Lost Ark is an absolute blast to play. The combat is fun and fluid. Even if it feels easy at times. The isometric, Diablo-esque style works wonderfully here. You can get a real sense of what is going on as you head into combat. Which is good, because the controls come with a bit of a learning curve.

Character Control

Lost Ark’s controls are unique, to say the least. They aren’t bad, just different. It did take a little bit for me to get used to them. But that could just be me. It’s possible that others can adapt to it better than I. It is also possible that there are other games out there that use this system, but I have not encountered any of them.

To start, you will not find yourself using WASD to control your character. You will be using either left or right-click to tell your character where to go (cue RuneScape flashbacks). You can also hold the mouse button to get your character to follow your character. This has definitely been seen before.

What is weird, however, is the fact that you do not use the number keys at the top of your keyboard for your abilities. Instead, you will use QWER & ASDF. To attack, you will use C (or the opposite mouse button to what you selected to move your character). To interact with the environment and NPCs, you will use G. The number row at the top of your keyboard is actually used for items, mounts, and songs.

This control scheme caught me off guard. It also took some practice in getting used to it. You almost have to retrain your hand on how it rests on the keyboard. As you progress through the story and gain more abilities, you will have to use more of the keys on the left half of the keyboard. Lost Ark takes full advantage of the keys that your left hand can easily reach.

With some practice, this control scheme becomes quite intuitive. It is nice to not have to stretch my hand across the keyboard to hit a 9 to use an ability. More often than not, I would hit the wrong number anyway. Keeping abilities clustered closer together makes combat just a little easier. It also makes it faster-paced. I feel like I can keep up with my abilities and land much more satisfying combos.

Learning the “Open” World

Lost Ark touts itself as an open-world MMOARPG. And it is… eventually. As all good games have, there is a tutorial section to introduce you to the mechanics of the game. Most tutorials will be in the first couple of hours, introduce you to all the mechanics, and you’ll be on your merry way. Not in Lost Ark though.

On the one hand, Lost Ark does a good job of integrating the tutorial into the story. It will introduce new mechanics at later in the story so that you are not getting them all at once. Lost Ark’s introduction is quite linear. You are free to explore, sure. But only in the sections that are unlocked as you progress through the campaign. This, in theory, is not terrible. Lost Ark is introducing you to a new world and is keeping you on track as you get acquainted with it.

I am not always able to sit down and play games for hours on end. Early when playing Lost Ark, I would oftentimes find myself getting a little burned out. I knew that it was supposed to be open-world, but as the hours ticked by and I was still in linear areas, I was having doubts. I was interested in the story and enjoyed the combat. But I kept asking myself, “when does it open up?”

Turns out, it was after about fifteen hours. Part of this is because I would take on side-quests and do some exploring. However, the game encourages you to do this. Through the majority of that time, Lost Ark was still introducing mechanics to me. Even after entering the “open-world” section, there were still new mechanics to be learned. The game was starting to feel like one long, never-ending tutorial. While it is nice to not receive all of the information at once, I was shocked to still be learning things after putting so much time into Lost Ark.

Even though the game spreads out new mechanics, it doesn’t do a great job of managing its information. When you start to learn about something new, you are inundated with information. Let’s use Mining as an example. You gain the mining tools and are tasked with gathering some ore. Once you finish that and have “learned” how to mine, you are greeted with a plethora of information at once. You have the mission completion screen, an achievement pop-up, an inventory pop-up, and sometimes another small tutorial pop-up. There is so much on the screen at once it is overwhelming. Oftentimes, these pop-ups are even overlapping. This makes the screen a hectic mess of information. It has even led to me missing information.

Lost Ark does this quite often as well. In the beginning, while in Prideholme, you are assaulted with information. It is a barrage as you learn about the essential parts of the game. The first time around, I was so overwhelmed with it all that I hardly retained any of it. I learned more through playing around later when there weren’t as many pop-ups and info dumps. When I was able to get comfortable with the menus, and could actually learn about more intricate things, I really began to enjoy Lost Ark.

Exploration and Adventure

Though Lost Ark’s campaign is combat-oriented, there are plenty of other things to do in Arkesia. Lost Ark will present you with an Adventurer’s Tome quite early in the game. This Tome is your way of tracking your completion in each area of the game. Of which there are many.

The Tome will show you a percentage of your completion of an area, outside of the missions that occur there. The Adventurer’s Tome is almost entirely about the exploration of a zone. The Tome gives you a list of stories that come from interacting with the environment. It tracks the vistas (triggers that play a cutscene zooming out on an area to give you a better look at it). The Tome even gives you a list of special enemy types and zone bosses. The purpose of the Adventurer’s Tome is to encourage exploration and world-building. I usually found myself exploring zones and tracking down the special enemy types and vistas. Making progress in the Adventurer’s Tome provides helpful rewards. This makes it all the more enticing.

In Arkesia, you are also able to hunt down Mokoko Seeds, one of many collectible types. These are pear-shaped seeds scattered around Arkesia. There are a plethora of collectibles to gather in the game. They aren’t all too easy to collect either. Sometimes, you need to find a way “off map” to hunt them down. There are plenty of hidden areas around Arkesia where Seeds and stories lie.

Those who like world-building and collectible hunting will love Lost Ark. I am not much of a perfectionist myself when it comes to games, but it is exciting to try and fill out the Adventurer’s Tome. You will have to check every corner of Arkesia to find everything. I wish the most luck to those who seek to complete the Tome.

Aside from collectible hunting, there are so many other things to do. You will eventually get a Stronghold. Here you and your friends will own an island where you can craft, trade, and even send sailors out on missions. The Stronghold helps you build a stronger team and work toward even more collectibles. However, tasks do take real-time. This is where micro-transactions come in to speed up tasks. While not ideal, there is so much more in Arkesia to fill your time as you wait.

One of which is building Rapport. This is a system that builds relationships with certain NPCs. Increasing your Rapport with them will lead to some enticing rewards, as most of the exploration things do. It also raises your Roster level. This is a leveling system shared between all of your characters. Think of it like an “account level” more than a “character level” (which would be the Combat level in Lost Ark). Raising the Roster level will increase the base stats of all of your characters. This system opens the door to use alt characters to help make your main character more powerful.

Exploration and world-building are at the heart of what Lost Ark brings to the table. There are so many unique locations and events that it is never dull. Unfortunately, it just takes a while to get to the “open” world. However, once you are there and begin to sail around, you will never have a dull moment.

Though Lost Ark has some issues with pacing and information management, it is an incredibly fun game. The combat is fast and fun, and you are rewarded for exploration. Even though I am not able to dedicate a lot of time for a single session, I still feel like I can be productive in shorter bursts of play. For a free-to-play MMO, Lost Ark brings a lot to the table. There is so much to do and so many things to find, for those who can dedicate the time.

There are plenty of exciting moments in the game. *Minor Spoiler* There is a section at the end of West Luterra that feels very much like the Battle of Helms Deep from the Lord of the Rings, but if you were the invading force. And I was completely ecstatic during it. *End of Minor Spoiler*

I am excited to see what else Lost Ark will bring to the table. I’m sure the game will only grow from here. I am much more impressed with this release from Amazon Games compared to New World. There seems to be plenty of buzz around Lost Ark and it seems that most people are enjoying it. Lost Ark is already popular in South Korea, where it was first released in 2019. And now there is plenty of excitement as it has made its way westward. There is even a Legends of Lost Ark event going on where teams from each region – North America, Europe, & Latin America – will compete to see who is the best. Lost Ark is already garnering quite an involved community and I am excited to see what the future holds.