At E3 I had a chance to interview Brian Green of Near Death Studios about the progress of "Meridian 59: Resurrection". This classic MMORPG was relaunched in 2002 and continues to move forward today, with improvements like a new rendering engine added last year.
;) The game offers much of what a player would expect from an online RPG. It is a skill-based system, with large and meaningful PvP elements that focus on player skill as well as character skill. The game also features extensive guild and political systems that should intrigue the average player. With years of content and balancing under its belt already, you cannot find a more mature MMORPG – a blessing when it comes to game play, provided you can stand the aged graphics.
Despite their lack of resources, the team overhauled the game’s rendering engine for a significantly modernized appearance in August of last year. Brian showed me the difference in real time, and it was quite a change. Is Meridian 59 as pretty as other MMORPGs? Hardly, but it has the benefit of age, a mature community and all the content that comes with that age. One mistake Brian admitted is that they launched their refined graphical experience last year at precisely the same time as World of WarCraft hit shelves, obviously, a very hard time to garner any notice. |
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