by Jeff "Ethec Woleslagle

November 29, 2007 - Ten Ton Hammer was thrilled to be offered a world exclusive hands-on reveal of Storm Island, Bounty Bay Online's first major content update that will be free to the game's subscribers. What follows is a preview of the game's premier expansion due out next month (December 2007), but first, some Bounty Bay Online background for those who may

Some Background

First ported from China's Snail Game to the west almost a year ago as the free to play, 17th century ship and swashbuckling MMORPG Voyage Century Online, German developer Yusho swapped out the original property's "item mall" for a subscription-model when it published the game under the new moniker Bounty Bay Online in Europe this year. Yusho, according to Product Manager Konstantin Drewitz, didn't believe the micro-transaction system supported the game's player-competitive aspects (e.g. ship to ship combat and capturing port cities) in a healthy way. Instead, Bounty Bay Online will release its first free content-rich update, "Storm Island", in the currently released German and English versions of the game (though we were told the French version - with the "Storm Island" addon included - will arrive soon).

The Storm Island Expansion

In addition to host of new sub-skills or "feats" for existing skills and a new skill cap of 120 (from the current limit of 100), new quests, NPCs, radeskill combat abilities (e.g. Alchemists can now poison enemies with unctions of their creation) and new Level 11 ships (the most powerful in the game to-date), the new content in "Storm Island" focuses on character exploration and combat (rather than nautical) for high-level players. When asked why Snail Game and Yusho decided to concentrate on character combat rather than the product-differentiating nautical side, Drewitz explained that, while ship vs. ship combat is definitely cool, players naturally gravitated toward the up-close-and personal style of play and the developers definitely wanted to support what players felt drawn to first and foremost.

The bulk of the new content, however, will be found in the island that shares its name with the update. Storm Island does have a handful of persistent areas, but at its core is a progression of four instanced dungeons intended for groups of five players. While instancing was previously used for resource gathering areas, this marks the first time we'll see a typical dungeon instance model in Bounty Bay Online.

Each sequential instance grows more difficult than the last, and each can be attempted at one of three difficulty levels (with greater rewards for higher difficulty). Before moving on to the next instanced dungeon, Drewitz balked at giving a time to complete for these instances, but agreed that each instance (with the possible exception of the last, Ancient Tomb) should take an organized, balanced group no more than an evening to complete.

Also worthy of note regarding these instances: by design, no maps are provided for Storm Island content. Drewitz explained that it would be up to the players to puzzle through each instance and plan their way through the trash mobs to get to the boss encounter, but didn't doubt that someone in the player community would come up with an illustrated map before long.

Continue to a visual tour of Storm Island's instances
and a first look at a level 11 ship!