Warhammer Online: Age of Reckoning Preview

Things have changed quite drastically in the MMORPG genre over the past few years. The change was drastic, but the cause was singular - World of Warcraft. Blizzard's cash cow keeps bringing in more and more money to the ladies and gents at Vivendi Universal Games, almost single-handedly pulling the company out of the rut that it found itself in prior to the release of WOW. Such it the power of this multi-million dollar franchise.

No one passes through this gate!

ARRG, YA MAGGOTS!

Unsurprisingly, it didn't take too long before other big publishers realized the full potential of the revenue that was slipping through their grubby paws, and now the race is on to produce the 'next big thing.' Hopefully, by someone other than Blizzard they think.

Enter Mythic Entertainment, the guys behind the very successful Dark Age of Camelot. Over the years Mythic has gained the reputation of being a very independent and reliable company, clearly focused on producing immersing MMOG experiences.

But wait, let's go a bit further back in time.

While Mythic was trying to figure out how to keep their DAoC subscribers and provide exciting new content, another group of developers, Climax, in cooperation with Games Workshop was working on an ambitious MMO game set in the Warhammer universe, called Warhammer Online. Alas, at one point in time, Games Workshop made a decision to cease direct funding. Nevertheless, Climax continued funding the development of Warhammer Online, but that didn't last long. Eventually, the game was cancelled by the developer.

This is where Mythic stepped in.

The company heads there were shrewd enough to pick up the license, obviously seeing great potential in the Warhammer world. They started building a new Warhammer Online from scratch, together with the folks from Games Workshop. Their hard word hasn't passed unnoticed as recently, EA stepped in, clearly spurred by the enormous success of World of Warcraft. You see, EA figures Warhammer Online: Age of Reckoning has a legitimate shot at becoming the 'next big thing', so they bought Mythic Entertainment. Mark Jacobs, co-founder of Mythic had this to say about the acquisition: "EA has the well-earned position of being the #1 interactive entertainment company in the world and all the benefits that go along with that. Mythic has equally well-earned position of being one of the most successful independent developers of MMORPGs in the world. Both EA and Mythic saw the advantages of being part of the same team and after that it was simply a matter of figuring out all the details on how to make that happen. As far as affecting the development of WAR, other than we are going to get additional resources, nothing has changed at all."

The logic behind this acquisition is as clear as Adriana Lima's piercing green eyes. Mythic gets a lot more funds to try and loosen the tight grip that Blizzard and Vivendi have on the MMO market.

Just throwing an even casual glance at the game reveals that WAR (Warhammer Online: Age of Reckoning) looks indisputably similar to WOW. Much like in WOW, the cartoonish look and feel of the characters and the violence ties in to the game's 'T' rating; the environments, as well as the characters' armor and their very anatomy strive to achieve the same visual effect as WOW. If you would ask Games Workshop or Mythic, however, they'd tell you that Blizzard actually ripped *them* off. In a sense, they would be right to say that, but the question still remains whether the art style would be so similar to Blizzard's game if WOW had failed by any chance.

As far as WAR's connection to the Warhammer universe is concerned, Mythic seem to want to have as much freedom as possible in that sense. Fear not Warhammer fans, however, as the game's zones will be ripped straight out of the Warhammer universe. So, if you've ever dreamt of riding or walking through Altdorf (the capital of the Empire), this would be the game to do it in. "The Age of Reckoning is set in the 'modern' Warhammer world. This is the world in which Karl Franz is the Emperor in Altdorf, Finubar sits upon the Phoenix Throne, and the High King of the Dwarfs is Thorgrim Grudgebearer. That's as specific as we're going to get, in order to allow ourselves the maximum creative flexibility in developing the game," explains the game's writer Matt Daniels.

While Mythic wants as much creative freedom as possible, certain choices were set in stone - things integral to the Warhammer universe. WAR will consist of 33 zones. In these zones, you'll find two realms: Order (armies of the Empire) and Destruction (armies of Chaos). We're talking about a classic struggle between good and evil, which I think should be even more apostrophized than in WOW. Simply put, the bad guys should be more vicious acting, not just looking, as the Warhammer universe dictates this principal. The forces of Order will be made up of Humans, Dwarves, and High Elves, while the armies of Destruction will be populated by Dark Elves, Humans, and Greenskins (Greenskins being Goblins and Orcs). The game world is set up in such a way that certain races will be paired up against each other. If you pick a Dwarf, you will go up against the Greenskins, and High Elves will face off against Dark Elves. Although this would be the natural order of things in the world if you will, you will not be bound by these ancient rivalries. You are free to travel to other zones and help your allies fight their enemies. At this point, Mythic has only announced the classes for two of the races: Dwarf Ironbreaker (tank), Hammerer (DPS unit), Engineer, Rune Priest (healer), Greenskin Black Orc (tank), Shaman (classic hybrid unit), Squig Herder (DPS unit - a la Hunter), and Berserker. Right now, Mythic is coming up with all the novel ways of having the units use their spells and abilities. From what I've heard at the E3, some of these abilities will be quite unique, like the way in which Squig Herder uses squigs to fight. He uses the damn things to make an armor for himself.

The prevailing theme of WAR, incidentally, happens to be just that - war. This is the main reason why Mythic wants you to play it, and if you consider their track record with Dark Age of Camelot and its Realm vs. Realm combat, it's clear to see why. This is where Mythic hopes they can gain the advantage over WOW, and considering who owns them now, I'm pretty sure they will have more than enough resources to try and pull this off. Still, one must take into consideration the fact that Blizzard is already working on changes to their (admittedly lacking) PvP system. The upcoming 1.12 content patch is dubbed the PvP patch, and I'm sure Blizzard designers will keep their eyes and ears peeled for any info coming out of the Mythic camp. I wouldn't be at all surprised if the features I'm about to reveal in regards to WAR find their way into World of Warcraft: The Burning Crusade. It's just the way that things work in this industry.