While Amazon Games and Smilegate RPG are primarily focusing on resolving Lost Ark’s launch issues right now, plans for a roadmap and new classes are still underway.
Lost Ark has been around in some regions for just under three years now. While a lot of content has been released and built up over that time, though, not all of it was included in Lost Ark’s release in America and Europe. As such, players have been flocking to the forums to ask when they might get a roadmap or details on new classes.
A community manager named Roxx explains that the plan has always been to launch with 15 classes and “add in more” over time. “This plan has not changed, and we will be rolling out new content in a steady cadence for players, since it is a live-service game,” they say. “The roadmap is still going to happen (I assume classes will be a part of it) but right now since we’re focusing on resolving the launch issues. We don’t want to push it out or run ahead too quickly before addressing what is outstanding.”
In December, Amazon Games explained that the team picked the line-up of classes to capture a good variety. The Sorceress, for example, is one of the newer classes to be introduced to the MMO in South Korea. At same time, the team also recognise that gender variety is important, so they picked classes that had both options available. While you’re free to play as a male or female martial artist, for example, you can only play an assassin as a woman or a warrior as a man.
Moving forward, though, the team do recognise that players want both gender options for their classes. “From the earliest days of Lost Ark’s announcement in the west, we heard players’ feedback about gender locked classes loud and clear,” they said at the time. “While not every class in the game currently has a male and female counterpart available, we wanted to be sure to include those that do early on. In the future, Smilegate RPG will be creating more counterparts for classes that are still gender locked, and we will bring these to Arkesia in time.”
The team also clarified that more classes would be added in future updates, though didn’t elaborate further. Currently, the Korean version of the game has newer classes and more specialisations for pre-existing ones. One such class is the Specialist who can graduate to a support role known as the Painter.
While Lost Ark has only just been released, a lot has happened. We have got a new European data centre to tackle server congestion, and the devs are still working to fix matchmaking issues. Like any other MMORPG, Lost Ark sees its fair share of bots, too, though Amazon Games and Smilegate RPG are on the case.
If you’re getting into this one for yourself, you can check out our Lost Ark beginner’s guide or Lost Ark levelling guide. There are lots of helpful tips to get you started.