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

by Cody “Micajah” Bye

For the last six weeks, the crew at Cheyenne Mountain Entertainment has gone silent, uttering not a word from their complex down in Arizona. Speaking from a fan’s standpoint, these instances can either be extremely frustrating or remarkably invigorating; often there’s a reason for the black out and when the developers finally emerge from their offices to speak with the players again, it’s with a bevy of new material. That seems to be the case with CME and Stargate Worlds, as just before the Austin Game Developers Conference they released several new screenshots for the Ten Ton Hammer staff to post on our site. The folks at CME were ready to talk about their product again, this time with some solid work behind them.

A concept piece depicting "The Castle".

This being the case, I knew it would be to Ten Ton Hammer’s advantage to sit down with CME at AGDC, and we prepared an interview with Kevin Balentine, PR Manager for Stargate Worlds. Kevin sat down with Katie Postma, Bill Pirkle, and I in the lobby of the Hilton and we took our seats on pseudo-comfortable chairs that had pillows permanently affixed to their cushions. Getting comfortable, Kevin turned on his laptop – always a good sign from a developer – and proceeded to show us through several brand new pieces of concept art and a few new screenshots.

As he progressed, Kevin explained each piece of concept art to us, explaining the significance of each picture and what sort of place that particular image would have in the game. For your reading pleasure, I’ve transcribed or paraphrased what Kevin said about each picture, and you can therefore experience the same sort of presentation the Ten Ton Hammer staff received at AGDC.

Turning his laptop towards us, the first picture Kevin brought up was the piece of concept art from an area called the Castle. “The Castle was basically a normal outpost that Stargate command took over and were using the structure as a prison for a group called the ‘Opcore’,” Kevin said. “As part of our in-game story, the Opcore are basically the NID or the Trust on steroids. We’re not retelling the Stargate story, and we’ve got our own things going on.  Since you’re going to be the heroes of your own series, we’ve got to come up with different sorts of villains for you to face.”

A screenshot of the interior of "The Castle".

“The next image is an actual screenshot of the interior of the Castle,” Kevin continued. “Here you can see the level of detail and complexity of the lighting that’s going on. We honestly can’t wait to show the players more of the screenshots, because our early shots may be good, but we’ve got better.” And in all honesty, I totally agree with Kevin’s sentiment; since we first started seeing Stargate images, the shots have gotten progressively better.

Next in our viewing was a piece of concept art portraying the Opcore. At first glance, it’d be hard to distinguish the Opcore from a normal SG-1 trooper, and there’s a purpose behind that. The Opcore are like the counter to the presence of SG-1; the Opcore are certainly fighting for the darker side of the universe.