The MMORPG New World (Steam) received a new update on May 26th: arenas are newly added to the game. The update creates an upswing in the Steam reviews, but the player numbers in May 2022 are now at a weak level.
This is the highlight in the new patch: On May 26th, a fresh patch went live in New World, the Arenas Update.
The highlight of the patch are new 3v3 arenas, a “small scale” PvP mode in a game that once lured with huge mass battles. The gag of the arena: a ring of fire pushes players into the middle of the arena. Either you fight or die.
Also included in the patch were a “PVP Reward Series” and “New Expedition Mutators” to New World, along with “Varangian Knights – Episode 2” which introduced new enemies for players in the 25-30 range.
A much-discussed detail of the patch was that the selected pronouns of the players now also appear in chat. The “preferred pronoun” will be honored when someone uses an emote in-game, according to the patch notes, which you can read in German here (via New World).
5 MMORPGs with the most beautiful graphics
5 MMORPGs with the most beautiful graphics
How does this affect Steam reviews? There has been a slight uptick in Steam reviews:
On May 26th, the day of the patch, there were 53 positive reviews, which is much more than on any other day in May. This was offset by 19 negative reviews.
The reviews of May 26th, if you just take that day, it would give 73% positive reviews.
A definite uptick from the 60% positive reviews New World has garnered just in the last 30 days.
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What about player numbers? It looks really bleak there. New World still can’t quite catch itself (via steamcharts).
You’re now at an average of 16,750 players. Apparently you still can’t really stop the loss of players that you’ve suffered since the release.
The update from May 26 does not bring any noticeable upswing either. The player numbers of May 25th and May 26th are practically the same. At the top you get stuck with around 21,500 simultaneous players.
New World is far away from the peak values for the release today.
Only in April was the number of players “reasonably” the same as in March, but since then it has fallen by 5,000 from 21,000.
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