It was a bit unclear what Amazon Games’ New World: Aeternum was when it was announced during the Summer Game Fest presentation. Not quite a sequel, Aeternum serves as a soft relaunch for the 2021 original. It adds new quality of life features, mechanics, revamped combat, and countless other updates. It also trades in the traditional MMORPG style of gameplay in favor of more action-RPG elements. In an interview with PCGamesN, game director Scot Lane described the intent with the relaunch:

I call it a spiritual successor . . . By the time this comes out, we’ll have been live for three years. We’ve been partnering as closely as possible with players to drive the changes we’re making. This is the culmination of all that. I was talking to someone who was playing, who hadn’t played New World since its beginning, and they said ‘this feels like a different game, just in the same kind of genre.’ I think that’s what we were going for.

I was able to get my hands on the game during Summer Game Fest as well, so check out my impressions below.

Hands-on

I had about one full hour with the game. I started out in the character creator, where I dabbled with my appearance and chose a starting class, called archetypes. As a newcomer to New World, I chose the Soldier archetype, as it was the most balanced and felt the most accessible for a new player. As is typical in RPGs, your starting archetype determines your skills and gearset possibilities, as well as non-combat skills like cooking or fishing.

I’m then thrust immediately into the action, as the demo started me out among chaos and a fiery shipwreck on the shores of Aeternum. Upon reaching land, the tutorial level starts. I learn the basics of combat, movement and navigating the UI. Compared to what I know of New World at launch, Aeternum feels like a drastic improvement. After the tutorial section, the demo opens up a bit more. In this hub area, I hunt, craft, cook, and fight a ton of lower level enemies. This helped me get an even better understanding of the world and its mechanics.

How does it feel?

The new and improved combat was responsive, fast, and easy to learn. Each archetype can only use certain weapons, and mastering them and figuring out the best combination for you is half the fun. In typical MMO fashion, killing boars and collecting their hides made up most of this section. Crafting and cooking were quick, and never felt like too big of a chore.

I played through an entire introduction quest involving returning character Grace O’Malley, where I fought to free her ship from the Corrupted Growths plaguing the island. By the end of my time, I had reached around level 10. When you level up, you get skill points to allocate into your character’s archetypal skills. Additionally, weapons have their own XP bars; the more you use the them, the stronger they’ll get, incentivizing switching between your melee and ranged weapons often.

This hands-on Summer Game Fest demo is barely just scratching the surface of what New World: Aeternum has to offer. By the nature of being an MMORPG, it offers players countless hours of content and replayability that an hour just can’t do justice. Find out for yourself when New World: Aeternum launches on October 15th for Steam, PS5, and Xbox Series X/S.

Also be on the lookout for a Confidential Console Closed Beta on July 11th.