Ten Ton Hammer - Taking MMO Gamers to the Next Level!

by Garrett Fuller

In the gaming industry, you’ll occasionally encounter a game and a development company that fall into an “info blackout”, meaning that they’ll go for weeks without saying a word to the press. For the U.S. press, this happened with The Chronicles of Spellborn, an upcoming fantasy-based MMOG that looks to have amazing potential. Thankfully, here at Leipzig the Ten Ton Hammer team got the chance to see the updated game and talk with Spellborn’s lead designer, Chris Nengerman, and “Sound Man”, Matt Florianz. The game is now really ramping up its development, showcasing some extremely polished graphics and new content.

Since our last look, the main story has not changed in Spellborn. For those who may not remember, the game takes place across “Shards” or pieces of a destroyed world. Players can explore Shards as well as travel between them on protected ships that can travel through the Deathspell Storm that separates the various Shards. Player classes remain the same as before. The Rogue, Caster, and Warrior classes make up the basic archetypes. The Rogue eventually grows into the Trickster, Skin Shifter, or Death Hand classes. The Warrior becomes the Blood Warrior, Wrath Guard, or a Fury Hammer. Lastly, the Casters can become a Void Seer, Rune Mage, or Ancestral Mage. From the demo I saw, this seems like a perfect reasonable number for the game.

An overall shot of the Spellborn booth.

The two starting races for players will be your standard human and a demon-like creature called the Daevi. Both races have loads of customizations that can be implemented in character creation. The guys mentioned that more races will make their way into the game as the story line develops. Another very customizable aspect of character creation are your cloths, armor, and weapons. In Spellborn only your skills matter. Loot gives characters no additional bonuses to stats; it’s merely an aesthetic tool. In Spellborn your attacks are skill based and not determined by the weapon you carry. Players can look how they want and change their look without having to go through a detailed enhancement chart.

For game play the designers at Spellborn are working hard to take grinding out of the game. You don’t have to go out and farm kills to gain experience. They would rather have you go through the unique quest system and develop your character while enjoying the story along the way. The game will have over one thousand quests and even expands into more with the compound quests that come up as you continue to play. There are epic story quests which take you all the way through your characters development. Also, because questing is so expansive, once you complete a quest it stays in your log book so you can reference it later on.

Someone taking a crack at Spellborn.

The crafting system in Spellborn offers players a way to create great new looks for their characters. Players will find resources throughout the game, especially in PvP areas which can later be used to craft unique armor and weapons. Also, crafting in Spellborn does not have a failure rate. You’ll successfully make every item you try to create. This is important because players can enjoy customizing their look even further as they grow stronger in the game.

On top of that, if you strive to be the best PvP player, or are the first to complete a PvE objective, then you will get your own statue in the town square! So when you complete your objective, make sure you have on your best loot because your statue will be standing for all to see.

PvP is an important part of MMOs and the crew at Spellborn has done a lot over the last year to really enhance their PvP. In the game, there is a deadly player arena where fights will take place in a structured situation, but free-for-all PvP will also be in the game. For those who remember the original concepts of the game, the Spellborn world did have five High Houses of rulers. Eventually Chris said that these will play a part of the PvP for players, but not at the start.

A Chronicles of Spellborn staffer checking out the gameplay.

We were very happy to see that Spellborn has come back after a quiet year of development. The team is working hard to get the MMOG ready for launch. If you have not seen this game I highly recommend you check out the screenshots and artistic style it has to offer. The rendering are very different and look great. The world is colorful and alive filled with loads of choices for players to make their characters look different and cool. Chris mentioned that several comic book artists had worked on the design of the game and everyone is really impressed with the outcome.

As John Hoskin and I left the booth we both agreed that Chronicles of Spellborn is a game you need to check out as a MMOG player. It has been quiet for sometime, but now it is starting to really push development to launch. The game play is fun and with no grinding to worry about you can really enjoy an MMOG that does not force you to play for hours on end. Thanks again to Chris and Matt for taking time to share an updated look at The Chronicles of Spellborn.

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