Just a month ago, Albion Online’s Sandbox Interactive announced that it planned to switch over to a seasonal, quarterly content cadence built around smaller updates in line with the three-month guild season schedule. At the time, the studio was already teasing the first of these updates, targeting January, and now today, the team has fully unveiled it.
“Albion Online enters a new era January 8, with its first update of 2024: Crystal Raiders,” SBI says. “This update re-envisions Guild Warfare in Albion Online, with Territory Raiding that brings thrilling new dimensions to territory control, while allowing smaller guilds more opportunities to strike during a season. Crystal Raiders also introduces Crystal Weapons, powerful weapons with unique abilities crafted from Artifacts gained as season rewards. The first three weapons fill out the Sword, Spear, and Arcane Staff lines, with three new weapons coming each subsequent season.”
The announcement article and video also herald improved hideouts, boosts, new tracking targets, a combat balance pass, a map overlay, and multiple quality-of-life perks. “Various underused melee abilities and items have been improved to increase item and build variety across various types of content, and both Heroic Strike (Swords) and Inner Focus (Spears) have been reworked.”
Incidentally, it also looks as if SBI is changing up its video format; while Robin Henkys and the Comfy Chair are still prominently featured, multiple other devs have been roped in to explain the planned changes.
