The fledgling VR MMORPG Ilysia receives its biggest update yet
The VR MMORPG Ilysia, currently in early access, has a surprise for its fans today.
Team 21 Studio announced that the Public Test Realm for the "largest update ever" will go live on Wednesday, 15 January 2025 at 11am PT / 2pm ET / 7pm GMT.
The content of the update will be revealed on the game's Discord server one hour prior to the update. At this time, the team will discuss what they have been working on and explain to the testers what areas need feedback. During the event, you will be able to preload the latest PTR version of the game. The conversation will be made available on YouTube later.
Ilysia was born from a Kickstarter campaign in 2020, in which the team raised over $150,000. It was released in Early Access in October 2023. Since then, a number of updates have been released.
MIXED has not tested Ilysia and cannot judge the state of the game. In terms of style and gameplay, it seems to be inspired by titles like World of Warcraft. There is a long list of features on the official website. However, in parts this seems to describe the aspirations rather than what has actually been implemented.
You can purchase Ilysia from the Horizon Store and Steam. The following video shows the content of patch 0.3.5, which was rolled out in October last year.
The age of VR MMORPGs has not yet arrived
MMORPGs are probably the most development intensive genre of video games. They have a particularly hard time in VR because the market is too small to support large teams working on a single title. In addition, the retention rate for virtual reality can be a problem, and many people don't want to spend hours playing in a VR headset.
The most successful VR MMORPG to date, Zenith: The Last City, got off to a promising start in 2022. But due to a steady decline in player numbers, development was discontinued in 2024. The studio responsible is now working on a new, unannounced VR project.
The much older OrbusVR: Reborn recently received a winter update. However, the previous one dates back to 2022.
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