The success of Lost Ark was never in question, but the size of it has seemingly taken everyone – including Western publisher Amazon Games, and developer Smilegate – by surprise.
Through its pre-sale and early access launch, Lost Ark attracted over half-a-million players in a day. The pressure to have a good public launch on Friday was mounting, and Amazon had to delay it by a few hours to ensure it can accommodate the expected surge of new players.
But it wasn’t enough. Lost Ark peaked at a staggering 1,325,305 players over the weekend, enough for queues to be increasingly long, with thousands of players stuck waiting their turn to play. Queues could last several hours.