At the top of the month we shared the news that Robin Henkys, the longtime game director for Albion Online, would be stepping down from his role. So imagine our surprise when the new Q&A video from the devs at Sandbox Interactive featured Henkys and the Comfy Chair front-and-center. But there’s a reason for that!
“I do hope that I am no longer the face of Albion Online,” Henkys opens. “While I still will be appearing in videos, dev talks will be handled by [new game director Moritz Bokelmann and co-creative director Michael Schwahn].” On the subject of the leadership change, the devs assure gamers that SBI’s duties being split among multiple people won’t change Albion’s creative direction or change the game too much from its current content plans.
That segues nicely into the next series of questions, which drill down into more specific content updates:
- “Orange zones” where PvP rules see player characters just drop their inventory are not happening; what is being tested, however, is a hell dungeon where this special ruleset applies to see if the idea is feasible. The idea is to onramp players from risk-free PvP to full-loot PvP.
- Graphics updates are being “researched,” apparently. That’s about all the team is willing to say.
- Tutorial improvements are being worked on, including “post-tutorial” guidance to help players learn their preferred playstyle goals.
- Introducing questlines is something SBI has been considering, but it’s having a hard time figuring out how to seamlessly add it and make it robust enough to execute.
- The devs agree that world boss gameplay definitely need to be reworked, particularly in the Outlands where guilds charge people to fight a boss in safety in controlled lands. Short-term, rewards may be reduced to discourage this behavior, long-term the devs want to make them more mechanically interesting.
- Expeditions are also agreed that they need to be refreshed, but yet again these updates will take time.
- Adding more PvE challenges is something the studio wants to do, but it will require the hiring of more staff to do so, which SBI confirms is going to happen. That said, the devs also stated their desire to keep things mostly PvP-focused.
- Improving fort warfare and objective fights is going to be a primary focus for GvG, but adding castles is not something that’s on the docket. That said, the devs recognize that guild warfare has kind of settled and new things are needed.
- Naturally, balance was brought up: SBI has hired someone whose sole purpose is about managing balance but realistically not everything can be balanced with every update. What changes can be done are promised with every patch, however.
- The devs want a console release, especially with crossplay enabled, but there is a great deal of technical hurdles that need to be addressed, with particular focus on making Albion playable on a controller.
For those who have an hour to kill, like seeing Henkys in the Comfy Chair, and are eager to see the new directors on a new Comfy Couch, the full Q&A video awaits below.
