Sovereign Preview

I already mentioned the importance of creating alliances, so here are the types of agreements you can reach:

1. AGREEMENT OF TRADE ROUTES: trade agreement, which will improve the economies of states involved.
2. MOVEMENT TREATIES: granting the liberty to move on foreign territory.
3. SAVE HAVEN TREATIES: allied cities can give refuge to your damaged units.
4. FORMAL ALLIANCESS: the most powerful treaty, guaranteeing military help and military collaboration.

All combinations are possible and it's all up to players to maintain or betray those treaties. Games with a great number of players will probably have alliances the size of NATO and Warszawa Pact.

The newbies who join the game several days after it started will have some disadvantages in comparison to other players. In order to protect their interests, they will have to seek the protection of more powerful players and offer them their resources in exchange. Each player will get a log file when he starts playing. These logs will be public, making all those who breached alliances, publicly marked. Some "dirty" actions like using unconventional weapons or slaughtering civilians will decrease productivity of your people. The most efficient players will, on the other hand, gat bonuses and benefits they will be able to use. You'll be able to change servers, thus virtually creating a stainless career.

Creating an on-line strategy where fights can last for several weeks introduces some technical problems. The standard question: What if I'm off-line? Got three answers: the first is that you can entrust your empire to an ally. That sounds to be the most efficient way, but how can you be sure your friends are true? The second way out is to entrust your country to the computer and tweak it's AI the way you want it to work. The third way out is to "Lock down" your empire out of the world. Being locked down doesn't make you indestructible - you do get a defense bonus, but if someone with sufficient military power decides to crush you he'll do it. If you do get attacked while off-line, you'll get e-mail, or be paged.

If the game is played by acquaintances or if there are not too many players, the game enables them to adjust it to their free time by determining when actual combat can take place.

You'll only be able to play on Verant servers if you pay your monthly fees. The price has not yet been determined, but it shouldn't be more than $10 per month. This can be justified by the need to maintain the servers. Each account will be able to create six characters, and considering the number of classes, this number should be sufficient. Game servers will be set in Europe, Japan and United States and the game will support several languages and include an English-Japanese translation service.

This all seems as ideal as it gets, all from the idea of combining genres to actual gameplay. The screenshots promise perfect graphics. The only thing spoiling the impression is the fact that the publication date has been moved from the end of this year to the first or even second quadrant of the next year. My only comment could be - worth of waiting.