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Lost Ark is opening up its business to North America and Europe after success in its native South Korea. The new free-to-play MMORPG is already shaping up to be a big deal in the genre.
Like many MMORPGs, the game comes with a variety of options to allow the player to customize their character. However, veterans of the genre might find Lost Ark's limited class and race selection a bit sparse.
Choosing race in Lost Ark
Race is locked to class choices in Lost Ark. This means that whichever character class the player chooses to occupy will determine the race of their character. Only two options exist for races in the game at this point. Player characters are either Elves or Humans.
Players can choose from seven classes, each of which is locked to a specific race. All magical classes, including Mages, Bards, and Summoners, are defaulted to Elves. Elves seem to possess exclusive access to magic in the lore of Arkesia.
Humans are the default race for Warriors, Martial Artists, Gunners, and Assassins. This means that players cannot select their race, except for by selecting their class. Players who want to play an Elven Gunner are currently out of luck.
Will race options come later?
Though there are a variety of fashionable cosmetic options, the lack of variety in races is a strange omission. Dwarves exist in the game's world, but are not currently playable, as no classes default to them. With that in mind, more classes and races may become available as the game goes on.
The class options of Lost Ark are treated a bit more like characters than they are like archetypes. In most MMORPGs, the game encourages the player to create a wholly original character by mixing and matching options. While the game allows players to select their character's gender, there are default appearances for the characters.
Only some aspects of the characters can be changed. Most of these are aesthetic choices, and the character's species is considered endemic. This is not necessarily set in stone, however.
There are currently seven main classes available to players of the game. There could be as many as eighteen more coming to the game as it expands. The game will almost undoubtedly grow as the player base massively expands. Any of the new classes could come attached to new races, expanding player options.
It's also entirely possible that the developers could distinguish race from class, but there's been no word on that so far.
