Not a hot take but a slow boil
Who else is excited for Nighthaven to be here? I know I am! But, getting a new expansion must remind us of our past releases. One of the main things on my mind is how the track record for expansion releases is tarnished by the one and only paid expansion – RotAE. Why do I dislike it so much? Why am I so pro-Brimstone? Keep reading! Find out my personal opinions! Be influenced!
Contents
The Success of Brimstone Sands
I’m sure we can all remember when Brimstone first released. The isle of Aeternum was rife with players exploring the big new zone, looking out for all the brand new game mechanics, the puzzles, the collections. Things as simple as the running lizards, and the baby scorplings were well recieved. So, why do we think this “expansion” was so successful?
Yes, surely in part because it was a free update to the game. But, I’d argue there were many other factors at play.
The physical space is vast and new
Players love to have a big, new world to explore. This comes with many things, many interesting landmarks, many places for resources, many easter eggs, the list goes on. The aesthetic choices for this zone are a type not seen anywhere else on Aeternum. This is the only desert, with a completely unique architectual style.
New valuable resources
The Brimstone Sands release brought along with it the rare resource, Golden Scarabs. Not only were they added, but they were only gatherable within the zone itself, and in a space with relatively difficult new mechanics. This encouraged players to group up with one another or prove their prowess at withstanding the new and interesting acid pools. Crafters made acid resist potions and chitin padding, and speedsters figured out that jumping on the chests negated damage. The new enemies that lurked around the pools had their own combat mechanics that were refreshing compared to all the same old.
New collections
Brimstone also came with its own valuable set of glyphs to collect. This further encouraged players to explore the new areas in search for more keys to unlock loot chests. The glyphs were encouraging for so many types of players; pandering greatly to achiever players who would be urged to collect the whole set, completionist style. But the explorers, the speedrunners, and the loot goblins would all want these too, of course, they unlock the ability for more valuable looting. However, you can side-step this by, again, grouping up with friends, because only one player needs to unlock the chest for everyone to loot it.
New furniture
My personal favourite, this release came with a whole new set of furniture. The unique architecture of the town itself certainly benefitted from its own stylised furniture items, but ultimately they were versatile for use in any location, and very, very rare. The unending grind to collect all of the furniture schematics encourages both achievers’ completionist mindset, again, but also stimulates the market by giving unusual items such a high value.
The Disappointment of Elysian Wilds
The release of Elysian Wilds was built up greatly, as was Brimstone, but none were prepared for the great disappointment to come.
What went so wrong? First, they took our town.
R.I.P First Light - No new land
Elysian Wilds was delivered to us from the very start as a cruel joke. Instead of a new and exciting land to explore, they took away our pre-existing space. First Light was a player-owned low-level starter zone. This meant that many, many people lived in the town and were connected to the land. People with 300 zone standing. But AGS didn’t seem to care, and simply cast everyone out without regard.
They took our land and they asked us to pay to have it back except without the town or houses or standing that had previously been earned.
Repeated mechanics from Brimstone
It seems like the devs understood some of what made Brimstone so popular, but they didn’t understand how to recreate it.
Elysian Wilds came with its own glyph-like key set – beast signets. These were similar, but worse than the Brimstone Sands glyph set, as there were only 5 of them total, and the rewards from their correlating loot stashes was never as sought after as the Golden Scarab (or Brimstone furniture set).
There were also lightning bugs in this new zone, much like the scorpions and scorplings of Brimstone. The same squishable little creatures and their parent, just reskinned.
Disappointing Edengrove replacement town
As stated earlier, Elysian Wilds stole away a player-owned town. Luckily, we did get the trade off of a new settlement in Edengrove. Unluckily, it is uninspiring. What looks like a cool, new, and unique town is actually a tiny, poorly laid out town with 4 copy-paste purchasable houses. This could almost be excusable if they added furniture that even fit in these houses, but surely they did not.
The good bits
Ultimately, I do think that Elysian Wilds had plenty of potential to be a beloved, exciting addition to the game. The unique flora and fauna were extremely intriguing, detailed, and consistent. The storyline even felt interesting.
There are interesting POIs and artifact locations, and even the familiarity of the broken down town we once loved has some charm to it.
Unfortunately, this was not enough to offset the negative player experiences caused by taking so much away and then selling it back to us.
Nighthaven release
With Nighthaven on our horizons, I can already see that it will be a gorgeous new zone, and hopefully well received. It is already confirmed to be free with RotAE. While I do think that this is a great decision and will encourage people to actually play, I have to say it just keeps making Elysian Wilds look worse and worse. Maybe having an actually good expansion be paid would make things feel less unfair.
Or just go fully free 😛 #makenewworldfreetoplay
