Spellborn: U.S. Publisher Discussed in Exclusive Interview

Cody Bye · 06-02-2008, 06:43 PM

A few months ago, the developers behind the upcoming dark fantasy MMOG titled The Chronicles of Spellborn opted to push the release of their title back to the later half of 2008, setting it squarely for autumn 2008. When the delay was announced, the Spellborn fans were disappointed and wondered what could have caused the six month hiatus. To answer these – and other – questions, Ten Ton Hammer’s Cody “Micajah” Bye had a chat with Pierre-Yves Deslandes, the public relations manager for Spellborn. Thankfully, Deslandes has answered all of our questions and given us the responses we needed!

Quote:

Ten Ton Hammer: Now that Spellborn has a fairly solid release date in mind, can you describe what the most difficult part of the entire MMOG development process has been for your team?

Deslandes: To be honest, I’d say that sticking exactly to the project planning was the hardest for us. TCoS has been delayed quite some times already, so I guess it’s no real surprise for you to read that. We really want Spellborn to be fun and all our efforts are put into making sure everything plays as smooth and best as possible and also, as we intended.

To read the entire Spellborn interview, click here!

Annatar · 06-02-2008, 07:10 PM

In many ways it will be refreshing to see a new game that is not based on some previous IP. There are many who feel that Spellborn will be the sleeper hit of '08.

Cody Bye · 06-02-2008, 08:01 PM

I think it definitely has a chance to do just that. But I wonder how much people will be influenced by the look of the graphics - it's definitely no AoC or WAR.

Annatar · 06-02-2008, 09:41 PM

Graphically, it doesn't look too bad. Sort of like a WAR/LotRO hybrid. But if they can pull of the gameplay factor, then I think that the game not having photo-realistic graphics will be overlooked by many.

Cody Bye · 06-02-2008, 10:03 PM

The only reason I worry is because it's still running on the Unreal 2 engine.

Sardu · 06-03-2008, 05:36 PM

Great interview. Even in such a major release year for MMOs I could see Spellborn still doing extremely well.

From the video footage I've seen so far, it does appear they're pushing style over realism which will likely help the game run on more system configurations. I haven't worked with Unreal 2 at all, but I've been using the Unreal Editor released last fall extensively, and can see where they likely had to rework the engine quite a bit to accomplish certain things for Spellborn to work as an MMO.

Anyway, I'll be watching for the announcement of their US publisher - hopefully it's not Microsoft though, or else the title will either be A) canceled in the US or B) sold off within 6 months

ModernDayDruid · 06-04-2008, 08:12 PM

Good interview. I am really curious as to who the US Publisher will be. I'm betting NCSoft or possibly SOE.

I love the art direction. TCoS looks as inspired as WoW. It remains to be seen if TCoS will be able to compete with AoC just out (which I love) and WAR and WoW WoTLK all out in the same timeframe as TCoS is expected to launch.

I do wish the Dev luck and look forward to a beta invite! I'm cautiously optimistic that TCoS will be a sleeper hit.

heerobya · 06-05-2008, 10:46 AM

I think they are doing a lot of things right.

The combat system will (hopefully) be leaps and bounds above what even Age of Conan offers, and the unique twist of the Skill Deck is the most innovative creation I think I've ever seen in the MMOG space.

The "dress to impress" mentality of gear/clothing is something I have been talking about and pushing for for years. It's really the next logical step from a system like Lord of the Rings: Online has where you have "dress" gear that governs your apperance and "stat" gear. If Spellborn takes off in the market and is successful, I believe this "dress to impress" mentality will become the new norm.

I've always thought that high end raid / PvP gear should simply give you more clothing/armor styles to choose from look wise, so you can either update your look to show off the new high end gear or keep your own unique style.

Sardu · 06-05-2008, 01:16 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by ModernDayDruid

Good interview. I am really curious as to who the US Publisher will be. I'm betting NCSoft or possibly SOE.

Those were my first two guesses as well.

Quote:

I love the art direction. TCoS looks as inspired as WoW. It remains to be seen if TCoS will be able to compete with AoC just out (which I love) and WAR and WoW WoTLK all out in the same timeframe as TCoS is expected to launch.

I definitely agree, and will admit that of the major releases coming out this fall, I'm all but certain I'll be giving TCoS a try before I'd pick up either WAR or WotLK. I was somewhat excited when I first heard about the Wrath expansion even though I've never been a huge WoW fan - mostly because it brought back fond memories of EQ's second, snowy expansion Velious. A few months ago I even leveled a couple of characters up to 70 and parked them there so that if I decided to check the game out again when Wrath ships I'd be able to get into the new content right away...

That said though, I'm way more interested in Spellborn either way!