When the Lost Ark video game was first launched, it gained so much ground in most of America and Europe that it overshadowed other video games in the gaming world. In just 24 hours after its release, the game clocked a climax of over 1.3 million concurrent gamers, breaking the record of the highest MMO ever played online by concurrent gamer count, and as well the second most played games generally in the same instance. It has gained so much popularity that a lot of players struggle to secure a spot in the game, forming humongous queues to find a way into overloaded servers. 

Within a matter of a few days, the game suddenly dominated both lifetimes and headlines like a rush of a hurricane, to the shock of everyone. But the plain truth is: this sudden development of interest by players has been nurtured for a long while before the release, and it will be a worthy effort to precisely break down the reason for this. In this article, I will be dissecting Lost Ark’s amazing success road, why it made an outburst of popularity in its first impression, and why a lot of gamers are strapping ends to have a taste of the game. 

The Origin of Lost Ark 

Irrespective of the fact that Lost Ark had only been launched in the United States and Europe, the game has been played actively in Korea, and has experienced shaky releases in countries like Russia and Japan. The foundation of its success is its lengthy pre-release history. The development of the game started way back in 2011. The first time it was mentioned was in the form of a blog post. Snippets of the game’s characters, combat, and the likes were made available in various diaries in 2014, but the game was fully launched in 2018.

According to records, Lost Ark stormed a record of 350,000 concurrent players on its debut in Korea. Just as most MMO games, this number soon depreciated over the years. However, the game made a massive comeback in the year 2021. 

How did Lost Ark become appealing to Western Gamers? 

The answer to this is however subjective, as each gamer is entitled to his view. Based on my review, I pointed out the areas that left me awestruck. The powers of the characters, the amazing combat, the exciting dungeon experience. Notwithstanding that the story wasn’t told effectively, it has awesome adventures, taking you to new and exciting places, which could differ in tone and theme. 

And there is the engaging in daily challenges, joining groups to conquer tough enemies, collecting resources, and using them to construct fortresses unique to every player. There is just so much to keep you hungry for more of the experience. Irrespective of the choice of the player, Lost Ark is compatible with everyone. 

Both sides of Lost Ark stand as a complement to each other, seeing to the desire of its fan base without either of its fans (MMO fans and ARPG fans) feeling compromised in any way. As an MMO fan, you get to enjoy the normal things you come across in MMO games, but with a lot more amazing combat. As an ARPG player, a whole new world and the awesome powers of ARPGs will be available to you, but this time, with an amazing world for your fantasy. 

Therefore, Lost Ark is grasping an opportunity to flood the market and gather more fanbases. 

What Stream Reviewers are saying about Lost Ark. 

There have been mixed reviews on Lost Ark from fans streaming online. Currently, the review has clocked an estimate of 76,000 stream reviews, with 67% of them being positive. These positive reviews mainly shower praise on worthy elements like the class design, the combat, and the manifold of activities carried out in the gaming experience. For instance, a reviewer made the following comment: “The most enjoyable combat system in any ARPG I’ve ever played”. Another dropped a comment: “It’s a game where your first few skills look cooler and have more substance than every skill in other isometric ARPGs combined.” 

The negative reviews aren’t left out. The major complaint from the reviewers is that many players find it difficult to gain access to the game because of the server being overcrowded. One reviewer bared his grievances thus: “No server-to-server transfers and populated servers have 4-6 hour queues in EU servers”. This is the biggest challenge the game is facing. 

There have also aroused issues with the Founder’s Pass, as well as challenges in purchasing Lost Ark gold. Some reviewers complained that the game’s currency had become quite expensive to purchase. 

Recently, Amazon had made clarifications on the game’s stream page, but this didn’t cause even the slightest adjustments in the ratings. More of the ratings on the app come from stream users, but the poor communication and server issue has negatively thwarted the general rating. 

How the server issues are affecting the gaming experience

As stated in the above explanation, server queues currently stand as a pain in the butt regarding the Lost Ark video game. Smilegate and Amazon appear to have underestimated the level of anticipation from fans regarding the game, and for this singular reason, a lot of players get stuck in choking server queues as much as a player as hundreds and thousands. A lot of players don’t even have access to the queue to start with, let alone gain access to the game. Instead, they have to deal with the same message over and over: “Cannot Connect Due To Heavy Traffic”. 

This high and voracious demand on the game’s servers is as well causing instability in the smooth running of the game. Most players end up kicking their way out of the queues, and out of the game. 

On the 13th of February, Amazon announced that it was going to arrange a hitch-free region server across Europe to help manage the high demands of the game. Since this will go a long way in relieving the tasking problem at hand, other problems will be created. This would mean that players won’t be able to multiplay with players in other regions. However, Amazon concluded that it was the best and only way to manage more gamers in Europe on the server. 

The date of the release of the new server hasn’t been known yet, but Amazon claims to be working hand in hand with Smilegate to ensure the dream comes alive. It’s most likely to take some weeks for the demands of the current server to be met. 

Summary 

The answer to the question as to why Lost Ark can be subject to review, and even further reviews. We say the game was all built on hard work, patience, and a long pre-release build-up on its fans- a strategy that paid off for them, breaking the 1.3 million gamers at the go. Their popularity didn’t just spring out of sandcastles on a shore. The Lost Ark’s domination of the gaming market for that lengthy period is one to be admired. And even though the flaw of the game is a tough skin to bite into, it still stands out among the growing crowd.