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

Joe Bostic: While the game we’re making does cater to thousands of simultaneous players, it is not a typical MMO.    Our focus is on the action of gameplay, sharing challenges with friends, and working together to achieve a combined goal.   We like staying away from the MMO moniker because it is very strongly associated with World of Warcraft, and dozens of other games like it.   The game we’re focused on with True Games Interactive is a real-time, action-based game that will stand apart from the large crowd of similar titles all competing for the same players.    

Joe: For many people, a forced subscription equates to not even giving the game a chance, whether because they don’t have the means to pay a monthly fee, or they have a personal dislike for such a thing.   It also means that you have to decide whether you’re going to play the game enough to warrant that fee every month.  With a free-to-play micro-transaction system, you pay only what you want to pay, which is much friendlier to a lot of people out there.

Joe: Petroglyph has a pedigree that includes many different types of games including MMOs, so we aren’t exactly strangers to the genre.  As to how the RTS experience transfers, we are quite adept at quickly iterating on new concepts. ;)  We like to have playable versions of games up as soon as possible so that the process of balance can begin.  With both Empire at War and Universe at War, getting multiplayer up and running first was a huge priority, and that directly translates to MMOs.  If you’ve played UAW, you can imagine what a balancing job that was – the MMO will be much tougher, but I think that our experience will show through.

Joe: Right now, we’re discussing the storyline of the game, how it will be delivered to the player, and we’re also working on a prototype that we hope to release very early in development to online gamers to get some initial feedback on and draw some conclusions.   More than any other title in our past, we are doing quite a bit of research in order to ensure this game resonates with our core audience and we’re involving them in the game development process to ensure that.

Joe: True Games has a lot of experience behind them when it comes to the Free-to-Play MMO market, and they were very passionate about bringing our new MMO idea to the world-wide marketplace.  They are a great bunch of people to work with.

Joe: Balance and mechanics really depend on the scope of your title.  With our game, we are focusing on one core element and everything will revolve around it – this simplifies a lot of the process and makes it a bit easier to handle.  That’s not to say that it won’t be a monumental task, but every game has its own unique set of hoops to jump through.

Joe: The most difficult part will be making sure that everyone has a fun and balanced game experience, and that those who choose to pay have no direct advantage over those that don’t.  The most exciting part of working with a game like this is seeing it all come to life and observe people play what will hopefully be a brand new game experience – I am already looking forward to the beta! *smiles*

Joe: I wish I could say more, but True Games will likely release more information when they decide the time is right.

Joe: This is a new direction for Petroglyph and for our fans – we hope that it will be a fun-filled experience for everyone, and I look forward to talking in more detail about the game soon!