New World Gets a Release Date

After a whole bunch of delays and course corrections, Amazon's ambitious MMORPG New World finally has a release date. Barring any unexpected hiccups, you'll be able to start exploring the world of Aeternum on August 31, 2021.

And in the meantime, you may want to check out the last major alpha update and this message from the game's director Scot Lane where he gives us a quick progress report. Here's the video part of the update:

And a new release date trailer:

Finally, you might be interested in checking out these fresh WCCFTech and PC Gamer previews. Here's an excerpt from the former:

Do the instanced Expeditions play heavily into the main quest storyline?

A majority of them play into the main storyline, yes. A couple of them are more side stories, though.

Some of them will occur naturally as part of the quests you're on. They'll ask you to investigate, and so on. Others you can find naturally into the world and if you already have the required tools, you can actually go into them.

[Wccftech] How many Expeditions will New World include at launch? How replayable are they going to be?

We're going to have an Expedition at 25, 35, 45, 55, and two Expeditions at max level (60).

Our expectation is that the endgame Expeditions can be replayed, the main focus will be getting crafting materials and weapons.