We sat down with the folks at Frogster during this year’s Game Developers Conference to check out their upcoming free-to-play fantasy MMORPG Eligium – The Chosen One. The game is set in the eponymous world of Eligium, where players will fill the role of the hero chosen to drive back demons that are seeking to destroy the world. It’s not exactly a mind-blowing setting, but I imagine anyone interested in playing this game may not care too much about that.
Players in Eligium can pick from one of four races (Elves, Viridis, Humans, and Pandas), each with only a single class, well, with the exception of the Human – who can choose from either the Warrior or the Mage. Each class can go down one of two paths and ability progression is use based. For example, casting Fireball a ton will improve your Fireball spell.
At creation, you’ll also choose from one of two factions and pick a Virtue. The Virtue system has an interesting effect on grouping, as groups will receive a variety of buffs dependent on the combination of Virtues selected by the players.
Combat in Eligium plays out in a typical fashion, though it was noted that skill cooldowns were fairly short in order to create a snappier sense of combat. We were shown the Virid’s Druid class, which can shapeshift into a variety of forms, ranging from a Werewolf to a giant two-headed dragon. The dragon form was pretty impressive and I’m honestly not sure why anyone would play any other class. Eligium also allows players some interesting flexibility when it comes to combat. You can choose to play the game in the typical 3D MMO camera angle or you can even opt for a 2.5D Diablo-style camera complete with click to move.
One of the more interesting ways Eligium sets itself apart is through its pet and mount system. Players will have to raise their mounts from egg to adulthood and these mounts can be used for mounted combat as well. The statistics of your particular mount will be largely dependent of how well you care for your creature friend, so be sure to treat ‘em well!
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PvP is also important to Eligium. We were told that players can expect to find guild wars, faction wars, a ranking system, and more in the game. Unfortunately, we weren’t able to sample any of the PvP stuff ourselves.
Eligium is currently in open beta and is set for a Q2 2012 release.
