The success of Lost Arc and European servers’ debacle

When it comes to gaming, there are countless choices out there. But very few games manage to make a mark in the modern world. Like those, you keep returning to long after their release. One of the games that have instantly gained massive popularity among gamers recently is Lost Arc.

It is an MMORPG (Massive Multiplayer Online Role-Playing Games). But its features have made it highly popular, though the genre is familiar. But what sparked such interest from gamers?

In 2019, Lost Ark was released in Korea, but it entered the North American, South America, and European markets in February 2022. The release of the game in these nations led to a surge in its player base.

The best thing that happened for Tripod Studio and Smilegate’s game development subsidiary Smilegate RPG is that the game became the second most played game on Steam. The record was achieved within the first 24 hours of its release.

You may be surprised to know, but the sudden surge in popularity of the game led to the overloading of servers at some locations. So, what is this game? Which servers were at their capacity? What is the company doing about it? All these questions will be answered further!

A brief overview of Lost Arc

Published by Amazon, Lost Ark has numerous attractive elements that fit enthusiastic gamers. Here are some features that garnered over 15 million players for the game.

2.5x isometric view

The key aspect distinguishing Lost Arc from other games is the 2.5x isometric view. The view allows the players to interact better with the screen. As they can see enemies from a top-down angle, the fighting sequence becomes more enjoyable. It enhances game control and allows players to hold the on-screen situation better.

Different classes

A great thing about Lost Arc is the classes. The newly released version for the US and Europe has five classes with various subclasses under them. Each of these classes has its unique powers and abilities. If you know the Korean version, many classes are not included in this version. Anyhow, the inclusion of Warrior, Gunner, Assassin, Mage, and Martial Arts classes have led to massive adoption by the gaming community.

Variety of quests

As Lost Ark is an open-world game, you can do a lot of different quests in the game to keep yourself entertained, such as:

• Work on building your strongholds.
• Go on an exploration of new islands on your ship.
• Kill your time upgrading your skills and play the market at the auction house.
• Complete daily and weekly quests.

PvP and PvE

The game support both PvP and PvE modes. It means that you get to fight with other players and monsters in the same game.

Apart from these, there are countless other aspects like getting pirate coins, awakening skills, power pass, etc., in the game. These will be in the endgame scenario after the player reaches level 50.

The endgame mode has three tiers: Tier 1, Tier 2, and Tier 3. Once you get in the endgame mode, there are various add-on things that you can do, such as raiding, global events, PvP, collectibles, and dungeons.

Lost Ark and European servers

The Lost Ark witnessed an abrupt increase in the userbase when it hit the US and European markets. As per Steam, the number of concurrent players hit the 1.3 million player mark within a few hours. The number was more than expected as the game was packed with features that were most likely to attract the right audience.

But this massive adoption of the game led to the overloading of European servers. As more users were trying to access the game simultaneously, the server could not handle it, and the players were queued. The situation seems to have somewhat stabilized, but people will still have to wait for their turn to enter the game.

The effect of this was visible in the reviews of the game. On Steam, the user reviews were mixed, but more were on the bright side. Over 60% of the Steam reviews of the game were positive. The rest of the reviews were negative and likely had nothing to do with the game’s shortcomings.

Almost every review highlighted that the game was inaccessible, which was obvious.

Is Smilegate doing anything about the servers?

As of now, there are no plans for Smilegate to increase the capacity of their servers in the Central European region. The reason supporting this claim is the complexity of the systems involved. But Amazon has taken steps to make up for this situation. They have proposed to make another game region, Europe West.

Though the region has been created, it’s not the permanent solution. Players are still expected to wait in queues as the server reduces the wait time and does not eliminate it. The professional team of Lost Ark is busy fixing server and matchmaking errors.

Of course, you can try to evade the server madness in other ways. For instance, you can get a VPN for PC and hide your IP address. What can this help achieve? Well, you will spoof your location, which has worked for many players wishing to connect to servers outside their countries. It is a classic trick, which might be helpful when playing online games and looking for the best server with the shortest queues.

Lost Ark is free to play on Steam. However, there are also options for purchasing starter packs that will likely help you out in the game.