New World: Rise of the Angry Earth Review (Fish Tank)
I share a mixed opinion of the expansion. While it has made some great improvements and additions it also has a few short comings. On the list of positives you have;
- Great looking area
- New mobs, some of which include re-skins, but more than enough are completely new
- Mounts
- Simplified equipment
- New Weapon (The Flail)
- New to tier equipment (Artifacts)
Though there's some changes that are not a deficit to the game mechanically, but really hurt socially. I have no idea why they've locked mutations behind the DLC pay wall because of level requirements and Gear Score (GS) being behind the DLC I really feel having the level cap and GS as just game update Quality of Life (QoL) additions for all players would have been for the best, but even denying the players the option to try as players that wanted stronger teammates could just decline weaker players or set level and GS limits in the group finder.
As well as I won't harp on the story too much or go into detail to spoil it, but I really thought this part of the story should have ended with a expedition or raid as ending the big bad guy with my character alone felt really underwhelming and out of place.
All in all I think the expansion is a good addition to the game, but alienates those who don't have it and as for it being paid they have supported the game almost 2 years after release making positive changes, free content and actively listening to player feed back, so I think a 30 USD price for an expansion is fair nuff.