The Antilia team has gone on record with a big announcement to change the entire project's direction. Rather than focusing on developing an MMO, the team will be creating a single-player game with a multiplayer option and that Antilia will allow for player-run servers and mod support. Players will also have the option to play through a lore-centric "story mode" version of the game.
As we're giving our gameplay systems a second pass, we are frequently finding this requirement directly in competition with the kind of gameplay we want to create. We want to create game systems that have a creative aspect to them - systems where if a player uses that system in a way we didn't expect, doesn't provoke an emergency meeting at 2:00 AM to patch that creativity out. I would like to design a magic system where players will do things with it I never even imagined, and I want to be wowed by what players create, not fear it. My point is not that MMORPGS are inherently a bad medium, but we've come to the realization that as creative people it is not a medium we enjoy working with. I'm sure experienced MMORPG developers could have told us this from the outset, but sometimes you have to explore the possibilities and decide for yourself if you can work within the limitations.
Read the full blog post on the Antilia site and check out the video below.
