A new world Dawns
Glitchless talk about their massively ambitious massively multiplayer role-playing game, Dawn
Massively multiplayer role-playing games seem to be the wave of the future at the moment, with games like "Ultima Online" and "Everquest" still holding on to thousands of addicted players, and literally dozens of new titles in the works trying to cash in on the revolution. Amongst the more ambitious online worlds currently in production though is "Dawn", a relatively unknown title from a new Florida based developer called Glitchless, which is apparently just a few months from entering beta. The sheer scale of the game is impressive enough, with room for 100,000 players and over 65,000 square miles of terrain to explore, making it over a hundred times bigger than the already sizeable "Asheron's Call".
Lead designer Jeff Friedman explains that "the use of genetic algorithms is allowing us to create a realistic, diverse, and of course very large world [which] will be travelable via foot, horse, boat, and - our personal favorite - on the backs of flying creatures". The other thing that makes it stand out from the crowd is that players who colonise the game early on will find an unexplored virgin world to mould in their own image. "There is no pre-structuring, no overbearing GM's, no NPC that talk gibberish, and most importantly no rules. It's as much a sociological experiment as it is a game. If history repeats itself governments may form and attempt to rule the world in an organized manner; if not evil clans may plague the earth with murder and mayhem. In either case it will be an experience that any true role-player won't want to miss."
It certainly sounds great in theory, but we'll have to wait for the beta to launch before we know for sure if it can live up to the hype. In the meantime, to find out more about the game head over to the official Dawn website.