Shining Lore Preview

Shining Lore is a MMOPRG that's been in development by Phantagram for quite some time now. Among other details regarding this interesting title, you'll also find some exclusive info provided by the dudes at Phantagram.

Those pandas are cute, but extremely deadly as well.

This party is a wee bit overcrowded.

The makers of Shining Lore have decided to incorporate a pretty comprehensive storyline both for single-player and multiplayer modes. Yes, you've read it correctly the game will have an off-line single-player mode with a separate storyline. As for the whole scoop on the story, my advice is that you visit the official web site, where you'll find more info.

At the beginning of the game, the player receives the opportunity to create his own character and furnish him/her with preferable characteristics, therefore creating a unique look for your character. This includes adjusting the character's general appearance: hair style, face, shirt, pants, gloves, and shoes. Intently working on fashion aspect of the game the developers have included a couple of hundred styles of clothing. If you get bored with all the dressing, make-up, chatting, mini-games, you can always head out into the unexplored world of Shining Lore to engage in various quests that will be given to you by the NPCs. Completing different quests is not the only thing you'll be able to do - you can create your own quests and assign other players to complete them.

During quests, you will meet numerous enemies such as malicious bunnies (that smack you with their enormous ears), panda bears (armed with tommy guns), flying cats, etc. Hm, it seems as though the boys and girls at Phantagram have a vivid imagination when it comes to animals. Anyhow, the good thing in Shining Lore is that when you encounter these bad-tempered animals all combat will be carried out in real-time. I'll bet that at this point you're thinking you'll be poking your cute foes with fuzzy cattle prods. Quite the contrary; there's going to be a nice selection of bad-ass melee weapons such as sharp spears, axes, and hammers. Alongside these, you also have access to various firearms and other long-range weapons like guns, crossbows, and darts (oh and, mustn't forget you'll be using knuckle dusters too - seriously). Experienced characters can use their working tools like the wrench to wallop enemies, thereby gaining even more skill points in a particular field of expertise.

PvP won't be included in Shining Lore, but there are other ways that give players a chance to battle against each other. The game will feature more than standard hand-to-hand fighting. Players are going to be offered the possibility to utilize different combat skills and various magic abilities.

One of the key parts of gameplay in Shining Lore are the mini-games. The whole point of the mini-games is to let players gain experience levels, make friends, obtain new items, and to generally relax. In mini-games you also receive different jobs to do that will correspond to the special skills of your character and the specific profession you chose for him/her.

Dress-up your hero.

The peaceful countryside is not always peaceful.

Differing from most online multiplayer games, Shining Lore features cute cartoonish characters and cheerful bright surroundings. The in-game environment allows players to use and carry almost anything on the screen. The world of Shining Lore consists of several continents - each continent has diverse inhabitants, culture, environment, and climate. As you travel through these continents, you'll get to explore at least 5 major cities.

Exclusive info

We also managed to collect some exclusive info from Phantagram during a chat we had with them a couple of days ago. We've learned that the opening sequence Xbox version will be using 'Vertex Shading' and 'Pixel Shading.' Also, Phantagram told us that Shining Lore is to have cross-Platform online capabilities with the PC, Xbox, and PS2. They also revealed that the Xbox and Playstation 2 versions are planned to be released 8 months after the PC version). And of course, it was confirmed that Shining Lore will be compatible with MSN Messenger, Yahoo Messenger, and ICQ while the players are in Chatting Mode.

The engine of Shining Lore has many features thanks to which players will be able to create unique 3D polygon models. When combat commences, it will all be presented in delightfully animated battles with colorful special effects, which look cool; especially when players start using their magic abilities.

As the development team told us, the main concept is a truly huge virtual world where you enjoy your life style and basically have fun. Recently, there were reports claiming that Shining Lore will have an online beta test soon. The beta for Asian users is slated to be online during December 2002. No further info was given regarding the English version, but we'll keep you posted on that as soon as we learn something.