Gods & Heroes: Rome Rising

[RogueSlayer]

Who (if anyone) is looking at this game aside from me? I really think this will be a huge game and I am very excited about it. Just wondering if anyone else is as well or if I am alone for now.

[Ijs]

Looks like you're all alone!


(Actually I'm registered on G&H forums, but I don't post there. The game seems to be some ways away. I'll wait 6-12 months before getting excited. I do know this -- it will be 100x the game Roma Victor is... even though RV people routinely trash it for not being historically 'realistic')

[Ijs]

Rogue, did you enter the G&H beta contest at Stratics? Something about choosing a caption for the photo. 10 beta spots I think....

http://boards.stratics.com/php-bin/s...b=5&o=&fpart=1


(I think the contest runs July 3-10)

I slapped down a few ideas, but probably won't win. Humour is so subjective.

Also of note:

Get Registered for Beta! - June 05, 2006

We are getting closer and closer to kicking-off the official Gods & Heroes: Rome Rising beta program, so now is a good time to sign-up for your chance to get in! How do you sign-up for your chance to get in? Well, the best (and right now the only) way to get signed up is by creating a personalized Perpetual Entertainment Platform Account HERE. This will also get you registered for the message boards, so if you already have a message board account, you are already signed-up for your chance at getting into beta.

As we get started with our beta program there will be numerous opportunities for you to become involved with Gods & Heroes: Rome Rising. Throughout the many stages of open and closed beta, we will have a limited number of slots available to bring people into the game, and several stages will be filled with randomly selected PEP account holders.

As the beta progresses, there will be other opportunities to get in on the fun though special promotions we will be holding with our partner sites and various fansites. Be sure to keep an eye out for those exciting moments, but most of all, be sure not to miss the first few chances to get into the Gods & Heroes: Rome Rising Beta, create your PEP account today!

[Sente]

This is one game I'm looking forward to and will try it out when it is released.

[Bezza]

I've been keeping my eye on this one for a while, looks good so far.

[Ijs]

The hi-res E3 trailer is stunning! That three-headed fire-breathing monster....

The only question is, can they pull it off with decent frame rates?

[Paksenarion]

Damn you .... damn you all ... especially you RogueSlayer ... now I have yet ANOTHER forum and beta to angst about.

I.am.not.good.at.waiting.

[Ijs]

My 1,000th ToG post.

Originally Posted by Paksenarion

Damn you .... damn you all ... especially you RogueSlayer ... now I have yet ANOTHER forum and beta to angst about.

I.am.not.good.at.waiting.

That being the case, do not, I repeat, DO NOT try to win one of the 10 beta spots available this Sunday night. (And I'm not just saying that to increase my chances of winning... ok, maybe I am!! )


Anyone who frequents mmorpg.com will likely have seen this 2-part interview on G&H done by the deceased website, Society of Gamers... these were some of the questions from Part 2.

Question: Games that take place during real world historical time periods face a unique challenge: How do you keep true to history while giving players the fantastic people, places, and things that they expect from a video game?

Stieg Hedlund: So the whole point of Gods & Heroes: Rome Rising is to put players in to a compelling and rich world. We have an advantage that most games don't have and that is the reality and the mythology of a time long past that still permeates almost every living culture to this very day. We've always said that we want to reproduce the Roman republic as accurately as possible, however when it came down to choosing fun or accuracy we were always going to choose fun over historical and/or technical accuracy.

The perfect example of this is the Coliseum. Our game is set in 300 BC and as many know the Coliseum wasn't built until around 80 AD. The problem we ran into was that the Coliseum was such an incredibly powerful iconic image of what Rome represented and to not have it in a game like Gods & Heroes: Rome Rising was tantamount to sacrilege!

So by building this game in this manner we are able to take this rich history and culture and expand and build upon it in ways that makes it the player's world, and not living through someone else's experiences--although there is a bit of that in here as well!

((This is exactly what I pointed out on the G&H forums. The Colliseum is quite visible in the G&H vids, but... there was no Colliseum in 300 BC. They went for FUN over realism, and that's a good thing. That is where Roma Victor, a game that chose 'realism' over fun, suffered the most.))

Question: Which of the old empires and cultures are represented in Gods & Heroes? Where did you find your inspiration for creating the look and feel of the variety of cultures present in your game? Did you guys use the actual topology of real-world locations that you put in the game?

Stieg Hedlund: We actually represent a lot of cultures in this game including ancient Gaulic, Samnite, Greek, Persian, and Etruscan. As the game progresses and Rome expands, we will definitely introduce several important and influential cultures and nations into the world.

As far as the actual topology, we did make a considerable effort to keep the map as accurate as possible; however we did take some artistic license with the terrain and the areas to provide for a more enjoyable gameplay experience.

Question: To what extent will players be able to customize their character? What kind of options will be available for body size/shape, clothing, weapons, and armor?

Stieg Hedlund: Customization is something everyone wants and rightfully so, it's the primary tie to your character and it's what makes that character 'you'. With this in mind, we have several things planned. At the start we have a full-featured character builder which will also allow the player to select their colors. By selecting your colors at the start of the game, every item you equip will be matched to the schemed you chose, this also applies to your minions. So now when you and your minions are marching around, you will be fully recognizable and identifiable as a force to be reckoned with.

As far as clothing, armor, and other gear goes, we have built our art assets to adapt to numerous factors including the male and female option. For example, in some games there is only one art asset for male and female avatars, and as such, the textures are stretched or shrunk accordingly to fit. In our game, when you equip a breastplate for example, the asset first checks to see if it's for a male or female and then it checks your body type. After this, it then displays the asset depending on those characteristics, thus the male and female equipment, while similar in looks, is actually two different assets!

Question: Speaking of exploration, myth and legend are chock full of exotic locations, items, and people. We expect that major places like Rome be represented in-game, but in what ways will the environment work with the story to give players a real sense of discovery, history, and immersion?

Stieg Hedlund: It's always difficult to translate the visual and explorative nature of a game into text, and Gods & Heroes: Rome Rising is no exception. While a lot of games are starting to take on this "randomly generated" land feature, we have explicitly made a conscious choice to build this entire world by hand.

I won't lie, it's not any easy task, but it has paid off in spades in a way that we feel no random generation ever could. When you begin to realize that the entire non-instanced portion of the world is over 10 square miles of richly populated land mass, you begin to get a feel for what we're trying to deliver here. You can expect to discover everything from pirates to ancient ruins in this game.

((C'mon, who doesn't like pirates?!?!))

Question: Part of what makes a game visually interesting is diversity in items and player animations. Many of the videos we've recently seen contain some impressive, but fairly repetitive combat maneuvers. As development continues, can players expect unique animations for each class, race, trooper type, and weapon?

Stieg Hedlund: Up to this point the only class we have shown off has been the Gladiator. Each one of the 6 classes has multiple combat maneuvers and as time goes on more will be added in order to keep giving life to the game. Gods & Heroes is not unlike any other game with combat animations, they can all become repetitive if you're only using the one attack over and over again, we just take it several steps further by giving you more to choose from and then having advanced and intimate reaction animations based on the enemy type and attack type.

Question: Games that allow players to modify the interface have seen whole communities spring up to support it. To what extent will players be able to customize the user interface?

Stieg Hedlund: Right now the interface is still under design and so we've been kind of hush-hush regarding its intended features, however we have said that it is based on an XML platform and will be customizable by each user. We have plans to post tutorials and walkthroughs for creating a UI that you are most comfortable with.

[Ijs]

WOOOT!!!

Won one of the 10 Gods and Heroes beta spots up for grabs tonight (was sixth out of 10 to post in the Stratics Race Race contest -- 13 people posted within a couple seconds after the thread was unlocked).

Now, it's a matter of waiting to see which phase they let us in..... Hmmmm.... will it be Phase 1, Phase 2, Phase 3......???

(They didn't ask for comp specs, so I'm assuming it will be one of the later phases.)

[Paksenarion]

Gratz!