TenTonHammer.com - Taking MMO Gamers to the Next Level!

by Garrett Fuller, Industry Relations

I know it has been a few weeks since GDC concluded, and we have extended out our coverage. Recently we showed the video for The Chronicles of Spellborn from the conference, and we also wanted to offer a brief write up on the game and what we got to see in San Francisco. The good news is that Spellborn continues to impress with its graphic style and artwork. The better news is that the gameplay was moving faster than ever and players can look forward to a lot of options when traveling across the Shards in the Spellborn Universe.

The graphics in The Chronicles of Spellborn continue to look astounding.

The demonstration we got to see for The Chronicles of Spellborn looked very smooth. The game continues to use its same style of interface with the skill deck or revolving wheel of skills. As players make attacks and use skills, the wheel turns quickly to present them with the next option. This allows players to customize combos and attacks that best fit their play style. The skill deck moves quickly and players have a great chance to select options rather than simply hit one skill bar at the bottom of the screen.

Spellborn’s two races have been given some real polish and looked great. The Humans and Davei look fantastic and players have plenty of custom slide bars to make their characters unique. Spellborn is sticking to the philosophy that loot has no meaning. If you want your character to look like a heavy tank, yet be a spell caster then you can do that. No matter what armor or clothing a player wears it has no impact on the skills they use in combat. That being said there are many options to have players look great and carry some cool hardware. Weapon enhancements will actually work in connection with skills; however loot will be on a equal playing field and for show only.

Combat targeting was a new feature we got to see in Spellborn. This feature is really changing in MMOGs lately. The auto-target model seems to be going away in favor of more active game play. The target appears above the players head and you must actively keep that target on your opponent. Also the AI used in NPCs and monsters is smart enough to get out of the way of attacks. This makes the combat very fast paced and active. It is great to see new methods of combat coming into MMOGs. The days of point, click, repeat, seem to be going away in favor of more active fighting.

The Chronicles of Spellborn may end up challenging the "big name" games when it releases in 2008.

The look of Spellborn is very impressive. Since first seeing the game it seems like the artistic style that encompasses the world really looks great. We got a chance to run through cities and small town as well as out into the wilderness to fight some monsters. All of the work going into the design is very sharp and detailed. Though it has a some what cartoon influence the world is very crisp and sophisticated. We did not get to ride on the ships between Shards this time, but the look of the Shard zones themselves was shown off very well. For those who don’t know, Shards are broken pieces of the world where players can explore.

Overall, The Chronicles Spellborn continues to look good and seems very player friendly from an MMOG standpoint. Seeing the new combat targeting was great and really worked to make combat more exciting. My only concern on this game is when will we see release? I know many players have been excited for some time by the game and some of its original ideas on MMO play. Hopefully we will see the game come out soon and get a chance to test out the combat and skill deck systems ourselves. For now keep up the research on the game and hopefully we can look forward to an upcoming beta soon.

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