Watching shows like Star Trek and Babylon 5, as well as other sci-fi flicks of their ilk, it's not hard to wish you had a spaceship of your own to go
gallivanting about the galaxy with, discovering new worlds, doing the swashbuckling epic space battle thing, finding the love slaves of GammaOmega 10, and such. It seems that the
gang at Westwood Studios saw something here as they are giving gamers the chance to do this vicariously through
the online game Earth and Beyond. There will
be a little something for everyone, those who want to blow up everything in their path, or make money hand over fist as a merchant, or wandering the the frontier
looking for new worlds, anomalies, and so forth, as they roam the reaches in their starship in this unique role playing game.
The game will take place a few hundred years from now where Star Gates have been discovered, left by an ancient civilization, that allow vessels to travel great
distances through space. This technology caught the interest of the different factions of humans in the galaxy, the Terrans saw it as a means of profit in their
corporate minds, while the Jenquai saw it as an intellectual opportunity, and the warlike Progen didn't much care until the Terrans approached them to be their
military wing in their plans for expansion thanks to these ancient wonders. A war was
fought for control of the gates between the different races of humans, but it
ended with a protracted Cold War and this is where the game picks up as players choose their team and set forth into the universe for glory and riches.
Players will have to choose one of these three races to play as in the game, each having their share of strengths and weaknesses, all of which the developers are
working quite hard to ensure are well balanced across the board. The Terrans will have a knack for trade, while the Progen will be combat specialists, and the
Jenquai explorers. On the surface this seems like a typical class system in the making, and in some ways it is, mostly in terms of how your character progresses and
grows. However, each of the three races have a very deep backstory in terms of how they are ruled and how their cultures have progressed which will undoubtedly
bring a lot more to the table compared to other online RPGs where the geo-political climate would often be little more than,
"Ooo! I just hate those elves!" and so forth. For instance, the Terrans are what many pessimists see the world becoming in the future, a land ruled by corporate interests, the governments acting merely as
puppets on their behalf. The Jenquai, on the other hand, are a group of thinkers and the
descendants of the first colonists of Jupiter's moons. They have no
want of money, though still use it out of necessity of having to deal with the other two races in trade, instead choosing to learn as much as they can about the universe. They
are a far more disciplined society with a hierarchical leadership spreading into all of the key areas of their society. Even more stringent though is the Progen
government and its society as a whole. These people being the descended from the original Mars colonists are a rugged lot who had to deal with a lot of hardships,
as a result they are far more militaristic, with a very strict caste system, going to such lengths as to
genetically engineer their society, planning one's future before they are even born.
Now despite the three races having leanings to one of these three proficiencies, trade, war, and exploration, it doesn't mean that they are
locked into them. So to
interact properly with one another it requires the races to have the skills of the others, so a Progen can be a trader, while a Jenquai can be a warrior, and a Terran an
explorer, and so on and so forth. How much a races inherent abilities will manifest themselves in characters who don't go into their specialties is unknown, but
somehow it seems a safe bet that a Progen explorer can still his own in a bar brawl. All of this means that players will have a total of nine character classes to
choose from when creating their character.
Progressing through the ranks will involve going on an assortment of missions, most of which can be chosen at the mission generators found at the various space
stations that will be encountered throughout the game. These mechanical marvels will assess the level of strength and expertise of the person looking for something to
do and based on what it sees it will access its database and present a task that should prove challenging to the player, but not result in their getting creamed.
Moreover, the missions will most of the time involve players being required to seek out others to help them out, encouraging cooperative online play. When
these missions are completed players will gain experience, allowing them to go up in levels. On top of this they'll gain points to allow them to learn new skills to use,
but in order to actually learn them players will need to track down an NPC to train them in the particular field.
Unlike most RPGs, players won't be spending their time walking around to get things done. While they will have a human avatar for when they need to wander
around space stations and planetside buildings, the majority of the time is spent actually in the player's spaceship. As such there will be
customization a-plenty to be done on the vessel, from propulsion, to shields, to sensors, even the most
breathtakingly anal gamer should find a way to make a ship configuration to their liking.
Once
equipped it's off to explore the galaxy, or conquer it, or make a small fortune, depending on your character class. When combat comes into play shield
strength, hull integrity, energy reserves, and all of the other expected aspects of operating a space ship come into play. However, the battles won't play out like
something out of Wing Commander, instead they will stick to the RPG style of the game as the likelihood of making a successful attack, or
successfully avoiding shots fired will depend on your level of proficiency in combat, not on twitch gameplay. You cannot die outright though if defeated. Instead your ship will be towed back
to dock for repairs and an experience penalty will be incurred which must be
paid before you can progress up in levels again, though it will not bring down a player
from their current levels when they are penalized.
For those concerned with PvP play, there will be certain sectors within the game that will allow for this, so those who don't want to have anything of it can stay well
away, and those interested can just head on over to those areas. With all of this exploration and conquest though, there will be an over-arching story to the game,
but it won't be written in stone beforehand. Instead the developers are taking a dynamic approach to the narrative as they will shape it accordingly in tune with what
players are doing in the game as they discover new Star Gates, alien species and so forth.
Westwood has quite the ambitious little project going on here, combining the role playing elements with a grandiose space exploration adventure. Hopefully they
haven't bitten off more than they can chew, but if they can keep the story elements coherent through the game's lifespan
and keep some cohesion in the vast and wondrous universe they're trying
to create we could have a real nifty game here.
