Lord of the Rings Online is working on 'remastered' graphics, delving, and alt leveling path
While Lord of the Rings Online is down a producer, it still has an executive producer overseeing the vision of the long-running MMO. Yesterday, Rob "Severlin" Ciccolini took an hour to answer a number of community questions on a livestream.
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The big news that emerged from the Q&A is that Standing Stone Games is working on a "remastered" version of the game's graphics and user interface upgrades. This isn't a top-to-bottom overhaul but rather a widespread attempt to bring outdated art, creaky UI elements, and archaic systems up to par with the newer additions. More character creation options are in the works as well.
Other projects in the works include a new endgame six-player dungeon, a "War of the Three Peaks-sized" update that includes a new region in Eriador, the game's first new skirmish in a long while, an alternative 1-30 leveling path with its own story, server improvements to reduce lag, 64-bit servers, and a "delving" system that will allow players to increase mission (and, later, skirmish) difficulty. Multifactor authentication is another project that the team is working on for the future, as is an "overflow server" that will allow free transfers on and off for high periods of game use.
More endgame content is coming over the course of the next few updates, as Ciccolini apologized for the studio "dropping the ball" on this area of the game. The producer's letters will slow down in cadence from every three months to every four months.
The studio said that it should have word "soonish" on transfers from closed worlds. Europe-based servers are a non-starter at present, however.
Ciccolini said that SSG is in "a transition period" as it hires more developers to grow the team — and more customer service agents to help reduce LOTRO's notoriously long ticket time load. He also said that SSG is more likely to hire a lead content director at this point, after which a new producer will be sought.
The new supporter packs were brought up as an ongoing sales tactic. "Supporter packs are a way for people to joyously support our company so we can continue to make more content available for free," he said.
SSG said that it's holding back a big announcement to be revealed at DevCom later this month.
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