Corpnews has a 7:30 min video about the early moments in Imperator, the sci-fi based game Mythic plans to launch in early 2006.
My early comments weren’t optimistic and I would still like to see them committing to just one game and do it right. With the announce of Warhammer Online it’s obvious that this is not the path they chose.
The UI seems a direct rip off from World of Warcraft (overall layout, quest tracker, minimap, quest marks over NPCs heads) and SWG (overall look, waypoints, overhead combat status) with the rest directly carried over from DAoC along with a reskin (the dialogue window for example). In general the impression confirms the scepticism. It looks and plays exactly like a streamlined version of DAoC, just redone in a futuristic setting and with some more polish. The animations, the controls and the “feel” are identic and the combat is obviously nothing more than a rehash of DAoC under a new ruleset.
That Imperator uses the exact same engine isn’t a news, in fact even from the blurred video the common problems are all visible (stuttering, jerky updates on “mobs” movement, the character jumping and “freezing” while out of contact with the terrain, ugly far clip etc..). In particular I really hate how the character keeps shooting in melee range without even aiming down at his foot but just staring the line of the horizon while an oddly shaped critter is humping his legs.
From the last Dev Diary written by Matt Firor we read:
Today, most MMORPGs don’t invite a new character into their world. Think about it – when you create a character in most current MMORPGs, the new character appears in the world, usually in front of an NPC, and that’s it. There’s no real direction given, no reason why your character is there, no reason why the world really cares that you’ve shown up in it. It is time for this to change, and this is one of the major new things we’re attempting to do with Imperator.
Now go back to watch the movie I linked above… Yeah. You start right in front of an NPC. Well, at least after a stuttering movie.
Revolutionary I say.
Other pre-E3 previews for reference:
– Worthplaying
– RPGFan
– Warcry
– Allakhazam
– mmorpg.com (warning: fanboy)
– Gamespy
– RPG Vault
– Gamespot
– IGN