Noah’s Heart: How was the Closed Beta?

I recently covered Noah’s Heart, a brand new Anime MMORPG from the developers of Dragon Raja: Archosaur Games. They’d released a new trailer, they’d announced their Closed Beta pre-registration was currently ongoing. And honestly? Since Anime MMOs are my thing, it’s a no-brainer that I’d want to cover it.
And while both Mrs Stix and I applied to the Closed Beta test, it turns out there were limitations imposed that we weren’t aware of.
On December 21st, the developers announced that they had expanded the maximum number of players allowed to participate in the Beta to 10,000 – but only the first 10,000 players that logged in would get to participate.
Being at my in-laws’ for Christmas… you bet I missed that opportunity.

This was the first Beta test for Noah’s Heart, and.. well there were some issues. Quite a few issues. Nothing game-breaking, but issues where players would repeatedly crash, players were stuck at 99% when attempting to download and update the game, there was immense lag.
Honestly, given they have Dragon Raja – a large-scale MMO, you’d think at the very least concerning lag they would’ve made an active effort to purchase servers that could’ve handled 10,000 players logged in concurrently.

Regardless, Archosaur seemingly fixed the issues over the course of the first day, and the remainder of the test phase went over without too many hiccups. One concern I saw from players – across social media and in various Youtube video comment sections was the fact that it looked too similar to Genshin Impact.
That the game, more specifically, looked like a “cheap Genshin clone.” I’m well aware that every “open-world game” with any type of anime aesthetic is instantly labeled a “Genshin clone,” and as such it was only a matter of time until this game received the same treatment, but Noah’s Heart is quite different.
On the one hand, Noah’s Heart is an MMORPG. Genshin is an online RPG. Meaning that in Noah, you are required to play with and coexist with other players within the world. There’s no option for solo-play.
Genshin has a plethora of different characters you can recruit. These characters are, arguably, some of the best looking I’ve come across in the entire genre.
Nevertheless, Noah’s Heart doesn’t have alternate characters. Rather, you pick your class from a selection of Sword and Shield, Dual Blades, Bow and Polearm. You then proceed to create your character – something that Genshin does not allow for.
You can recruit Waifu’s, though, from what I’ve seen, however, as opposed to being able to actively use them like in Tower of Fantasy, the Waifu’s play more of a passive role, buffing, debuffing and providing support from afar.
This does admittedly add additional layers to the combat, as depending on which Waifu’s you bring with you into battle the course of the encounter could differ substantially.
I’m uncertain of how many Waifu’s there are to recruit, how you go about recruiting all of them or how many you’re limited to equipping at any given time. I’ll need to get into the English version of the game to fully test that out.

If I were to compare this to any other title, I’d say it most closely resembles Dragon Raja. I played Dragon Raja on PC recently, and this game looks like a more polished version of it. Graphically, anyway.
I’d always thought Archosaur did incredibly well with regards to the style of the game, and I feel as though Noah’s Heart is no different. This is built using Unreal Engine 4, like most MMOs built for mobile devices seem to be doing in this day and age.
There are points where I look at the game and think it looks a little barren. And that’s more than fine – they are, after all, still heavily in the process of developing the game, and this was their first smaller-scale Beta test. I’m hoping – genuinely hoping that this is not how the game looks when it fully releases.

The combat itself actually looked and felt pretty good. Movement felt fast, felt fluid. Your actions looked very responsive. The abilities themselves didn’t seem overwhelmingly over-the-top. Rather, much more tame in scope and scale.
But then again the only combat I saw was low level, so it’s difficult to accurately gauge how combat will end up with 30 people spamming AoEs in large-scale content.
I believe the combat is kinda hybrid? You could use abilities without a target, but some abilities would lock on. I honestly wish I got to participate in this myself as I would’ve been capable of delving much deeper into it.

But you know what? I feel as though I can more accurately show you how the combat works by utilizing our trusty friend: Youtube. Do note that the gameplay I plan on showing is from other Youtuber’s, so please, make sure to check them and their channels out if you want to watch the full video and get the full experience!

To summarize: Noah’s Heart seems to be a competent MMORPG with a lot of potential, much like Dragon Raja had. The game features a completely open-world for players to explore. It has some fluid hybrid combat.
There’s a functional mount system, by air, land and sea. There are dungeons and raids for players to run. There are guilds for players to join. There are large cities for players to AFK in. There are various different professions you can engage in and level.
You can decorate your own house. And most importantly? You can play with hundreds, if not thousands of other players because this is an MMORPG.

And I know what you’re all thinking right now.
“Stix, is this only for mobile?” “Stix, is this coming out in 2022?” “Stix, is this coming out in English?”
It is currently unconfirmed what platforms specifically this will be released on. Dragon Raja, Archosaur Games’ other MMORPG is cross-platform between PC and Mobile devices. So it stands to reason they would want to take the same route with Noah’s Heart.
There is no confirmed release date as of December 2021. It is very likely to be releasing in 2022, given we’re already witnessing the game’s first Closed Beta test. Will it be released in English as well? Probably. Dragon Raja was, and the developers look like they want to cater to as many players as possible.

I don’t think Noah’s Heart is going to be the “next big MMORPG,” but I definitely believe it has the potential to be a solid cross-platform MMO one day. It might not, but let’s not disregard it before it has the chance to wow us. Or let us down.