Horizons: Empire of Istaria

A new game is gearing up and preparing to enter the fray of massively multiplayer online role-playing games.

Set in the medieval and somewhat mythical land of Istaria, Horizons features a unique character class, a huge and seamless world, an encroaching menace, and a deep skill system.

The game is being developed by Artifact Entertainment and will be published by Atari in the fall.

Though still in early beta, I was fortunate enough to get into the test group for this game. Being a huge fan of MMORPGs, it was an offer that was eagerly accepted.

The first step is to create a character class. There are several to choose from and you easily drop one skill to pick up another. However, players will find that working a skill is not a simple chore. It requires perseverance and dedication.

The game sports nine playable character races, which include dwarves, elves, humans, fiends and dragons. As the latter players will first be limited to the ground but as time moves along, their wings will get stronger and they will eventually be able to fly. However, dragons are not the community-oriented species that, say, humans are, and tend to be a little more solitary - well, at the least greedy, simply because their status is related to the size of each dragon’s horde.

Istaria itself is an amazing land, with floating islands in the sky, huge cities, and a lot of wilderness areas. The world is 32k by 40k in size, and will take quite a while to traverse. Dragons can fly across it in about 1 and ½ hours.

After choosing a character class, players are transported to the newcomer area of Istaria. Equipped with primary weapons and crafting tools, the trek begins to skill up enough to venture to other areas of the realm. The adventure truly begins once you have selected an occupation such as scout, warrior or healer, and then have picked a crafting class - outfitter, blacksmith or scholar (though there are others).

As players enter the realm with not the best of clothing or weapons, it is imperative to level up to better equipment. While you may find some better armor and weapons available, you do have to have a high enough skill level to use them. The general starting routine is, once you have selected a class and trade, to hunt, collect resources and then find the crafting station to refine the resources. Experience is accrued as you go. You can hunt deer, skin them for the hides, then tan the hides into leather strips in order to make leather-based armor once you have acquired that skill.

At each level, new skills become available. For some, you will need to see your trainer. In addition to general hunting, you can pick up quests to kill so many of a certain type of mob. This results in better rewards from your trainer.

One interesting aspect of the player trade system is that while you may find the odd special drop on mobs killed, the truly exceptional or worthwhile armor or weapons seem to be player crafted. And because the game is intent on creating a community of its classes, housing will be available as well - though this must be built.

The world of Istaria is a wondrous land, lushly rendered and rich with resources. The animation is, at this point, a little stilted or at least not as realistic in some regards as other MMORPGs. Player characters tent to clump along instead of run. But the combat is well measured, and because of the control configuration, players can easily switch from a ranged weapon to a melee weapon quickly. There is a hot bar, and weaponry, skills and crafting tools can be placed there.

As the game relies more on keyboard controls for movement, that leaves the mouse controls free. You may have a bow armed for ranged attacks, and the mob aggro’s on one and attacks. When it gets into melee range, you merely click on the weapon you wish to change to and it is armed.

The control elements are fairly intuitive and simple to master. The inventories are a little hard to manage at this stage because of the randomness of the drops into the pack, but items do stack and you can move them around. You also have access to a bank to store items, and you can pawn excess materials, recipes or items for currency.

Horizons is an intriguing, imaginative fantasy world. It is based on the three M’s - magic, melee and missile - in a somewhat medieval realm that is ready for players to win and settle. This game shows promise not only with its unique character classes and deep skill system, but in the vastness of the realm. There is always someplace to go, or something to do. Live events will keep players on their toes as well. Even at a first glance, in early beta, it is apparent that Artifact’s Horizons has the potential to make a mark on the world of MMORPGs and draw a strong and steady fan base at a time when the genre is about to sport several high-profile titles.