All that we know about ArcheAge

This article was translated from http://forums.goha.r...ad.php?t=445567
Is also a copy of http://forums.goha.r...ad.php?t=455541

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26 February 2010, the company XLGames has officially announced a new MMORPG ArcheAge, which uses CryEngine 2. The development of the game began in 2006. In august 2007, XLGames purchased CryEngine 2. The game is supposed to meet release in the beginning of 2011.
More information on CryEngine 2.

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Jake Song is a legendary game developer in South Korea, he has played a great part in creating Lineage. In march 2003 he left NCSoft and founded XL Games. To write the scenario for the game, XLGames hired a known Korean novelist. More about Jake Song. Jake Song’s interview My vision of MMORPG’s.
The official website of the game - www.archeage.com/en.

About the game –the developers promise us a community like in Ultima Online, PvE like in World of Warcraft and PvP like in Lineage 2. The game itself is developed as a “Sandbox” – where the player is completely free to chose what to do, and how to live. He doesn’t have to develop in strict boundaries like in World of Warcraft for example. GRB (Game Rating Board) – South Korean organization, that sets a game age rating, set 15+ for ArcheAge. The budget of the game is 25 million dollars. 15 million of investments from GigaMedia and 10 million from the company’s budget. Koreans want players to have a big impact on the world: each server will be unique, due to players developing their world’s history, map themselves.
There are 8 races in the game world, 5 of which are said to be unique.

Details about the game.

Class pick is like in Ultima Online – You choose between Warrior, Priest, Mage, Ranger, and the 5th choice is CUSTOM – you can make yourself. The system of classes works like this:
You have 10 main combat skills. When you start, you can pick only 3 of them. Afterwards, you can deactivate some, activate others, but the maximum activated is set at 3. So overall it makes 120 variations possible.
Skills -
- Combat - Close combat
- Witchcraft - Debuffs, Crowd control.
- Invincibility - Tanks skills, all for defense and survivability.
- Will - Magical damage, magic defence, opening portals.
- Necromancy - Necromancer. Period.
- Wild nature - Ranger, taming skills.
- Magic - Magic.
- Assasin - Burst damage pvp build.
- Romance - Buffs (you sing, you play)
- Love - Heal and resurrect allies.
Skill list

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1. Combat - melee combat
Vandals Slash - 4 consecutive attacks at the enemy
Chyeoolrigi - damages an opponent and raises him from the ground for 1.2 seconds
Gareugi land - damages surrounding enemies and lowers their running speed by 50% for 3 seconds.
Light of her hands - increases attack speed by 33% for 15 seconds.
Hoeohribegi - Knockback attack
Congestion - increases attack speed and damage by 5% for 30 seconds. (also increases running speed, but this isn't confirmed)

2. Witchcraft - Debuffs and crowd control skills
Mental fracture - damages an enemy and lowers their vigor for 5 seconds.
The hands of the land - damage an enemy and roots them to the ground
Vertigo - lowers running speed and attack speed of an opponent by 50% for 9 seconds.
Bubbles - raises an enemy from the ground in an air bubble
Whispers of fear - puts an opponent into feared state
Summons evil - summons a minion

3. Invincibility - tanking and survivability skills
Shield hit - hits an enemy with a shield and interrupts casting.
Chiltemyeon Hit - makes the user immune to stun effect and increases defense from 5% to 30% for 15 seconds (not sure whether the % number is random)
Farewell to arms - damages and disarms an opponent for 6 seconds
Increase in life - increases HP by 79 for 20 minutes
Look At Me - 75% chance to taunt an enemy for 5 seconds.
Invincible - makes your character immune to damage for 12 seconds (don't get too happy - it probably has a rather long cooldown so the tank can't just spam it)

4. Will - magic damage, buffing and teleport skills tree
Teleportation - teleports the caster (and party members?) 20 meters ahead.
Sodeurakjil - interrupts enemy casting
Explosion energy - AoE (Area of Effect) damaging skill
Magic off - Increases resistance to magic
Energy generation - Transfer HP to manna
Roar Magic - AoE DOT (damage over time) skill.

5. Necromancy - necromancy and damaging skills
Invisible hand - decreases enemy's cast speed, attack and running speed. The spell is interrupted if the caster moves.
Hell of a window - damages enemies in a 5 meter radius. Roots for one second, ignoring armor.
Revenge of the armor - damages an enemy for 11 seconds ( every 2 seconds)
All Hush - Silences enemies around the caster for 9 seconds.
Feign Death - not sure how this works yet.
Ghost summoning - summons a ghost

6. Wild nature - archer and beast taming skills
Dokhwasal - ranged attack (also gives some kind of effect for 9 seconds)
Rise - levitates the caster
Take the beast - tames an animal
Shock Arrow - stuns an enemy for 3.2 seconds
Survival Instinct - increases running speed for 23 seconds and makes the caster immune to fear effect. Constantly consumes manna and hp.
Arrows rain - AoE skill which damages the area for 6 seconds.

7. Magic - magic :)
Spark clusters - fireball skill
Ice Arrow - damages an enemy and lowers their walking/running speed.
Shield - for 60 seconds creates a shield around a caster. Consumes twice the absorbed damage in manna. (so if the shield absorbed 50 points of damage it uses up 100 points of manna)
Wrath of the bolts - removes gravitation around the caster for 12 seconds (I guess it levitates enemies if they come too close)
Shooting star - meteor skill which stuns an area for 6 seconds.

8. Assasin - stealthy damaging skills
Unhealed wounds - damages an enemy once and then adds additional damage in the next 5 seconds. Lowers opponent's attack speed by 20%
Stealth - hides the caster but lowers his walking speed by 50%
Shadow Strike - attacks an enemy from 'hide' state
Healing kisses - heals the caster and has 50% chance to remove a debuff
Quick moves - increases movement speed, dodge (speed*2, dodge *2) and gives an immunity to poison for 15 seconds.
Raided - attacks an enemy from a distance, stuns and gives 140% of additional damage. (assassin jumps at a target from afar)

9. Romance - helpful buffing skills/songs
Myeongsanggok of focus - increases target's intellect by 8 for 20 minutes
Lively march - increases target's movement speed by 20%
Healing Dances - regenerates hp and mp of nearby party members
Hum of fantasy - not sure what it does yet
Lively extravaganza - increases party member's attack
Ghostly lullaby - not sure what it does yet

10. Love - healing and resurrecting skills
Light and darkness - regenerates party member's hp and damages enemies
Vitality like a fountain - regenerates hp for 15 seconds
Love and Friendship - regenerates hp
Resurrection - resurrects a fallen ally (cannot use in combat)
The recovery room - creates a resting room for allies
Nightfall - covers allies in darkness making them invisible to the enemies.
The size of the world exceeds the size of World of Warcraft. In total, there are 3 continents, 1 of which can be conquered by players, and hold sieges like in Lineage 2. The other two have some sort of war going on between them. The world is seamless, you can travel between continents with the help of a boat. The developers don't want to implement teleportation, since it will destroy the feeling of a massive world. There is no information yet, about player controlled boats.
A city, players can conquer.

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About mass pvp - yes, it will be included, even in this stage of the project. 100 people can move without lags, interacting with each other. The boy will be target based for most spells and range, melee skills, some of which can be used on territory like in WoW or UO for example. There is also mounted combat. In the fight, you can raise yourself or your enemies in the air, like seen on screenshots. There was some ranger dude floating in the air, shooting people from the sky noticed already. Magic doesnt use reagents.
Magic Screenshots

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There is a house construction system similar to Ultima Online: You will have your yard, your house. However the housing spots will be available to only about 50% of the players at release, because there is simply not enough space. That will be fixed with various updates post release. You can construct different houses, by size and type. You can construct public and private houses, unite them into villages. You can hire a NPC for your house, or to protect your yard, you can grow crops, grapes, make wine out of grapes, and sell, drink it with other players. The house can be used as a house, as a crafting station or as a shelter. Hostile guilds can spoil your yard, as it seems.
Construction steps.

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There is also a labor point system. They accumulate all the time, no matter if you are online or offline. You can borrow them, hire other players, and use them to construct houses, to craft, to have fun, etc.
About the interface. Each player has his beloved style of interface. Some prefer a wide screen, others combinations of various skills, others see as much information on the screen as possible, and so on. In ArcheAge it is rather simple to customize and move around the interface on the screen, as you like. Like for example if you customize it right, you can exchange equipped items without opening the inventory. About the minimap: There is no minimap. In the world of ArcheAge there is no place for a minimap. A player who is familiar with the evolving world should be able to draw paths and mark any information. XLGames is currently developing a powerful navigation system, that allows easy share, check, and use of such information.
Mounts system: In the 1st CBT, only horses are available. But in the future, you will have access to alot of types of mounts. You can actually fight on them, shoot from your bow, defend yourself by blocking the attacks with your horses first pair of legs, etc. You can get the horse, when you complete a quest on level 3 or 4. When you summon the horse, it appears in the game, and you can mount it alone or with a friend. Then you can dismount from it, and order it to leave to your inventory. You can also equip armor, helmets, saddlebags on your horse.
Other information: Every object in the world can be interacted with, its not just for decoration usually :). You can climb a tree, you can get fruits from it, or you can cut it down and use it as a bridge over a river. You can also plant the trees almost anywhere you want, and they will grow overtime. For example you can plant a forest with your friends, and some person that runs by will get a feeling that he is lost, because there was no forest here before.
Korean players made a forest.

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Stages of tree growth.

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About armors - everyone can wear any type of armor, and it will protect from different types of attacks.
The game has a large quantity of freedom, just like in UO.
You can gather ore from random nods spread across the world.
Players can throw ropes and climb buildings, pass over rivers, as you can notice on some videos and screenshots.
When you die, you ressurect at the nearest temple with all your gear. It is however unknown if you lose your experience.
You can actually enchant your items, like in lineage 2. There is a chance of fail.
You gather the loot from corpses. You come up to the corpse, you click on it, a window pops up, and you take the loot. You can also kick the corpse around :).

1 Closed beta test

In the 1st beta test players will test basic ingame systems. That includes: House building, object interaction, crafting, class stats, combat, interface, animations, art style, characters. You could build your house on a field, grow crops, but all of this isn't completed yet. The developers still have many ideas, and most of them are in development. They want to get as much reviews as possible, to construct this game with the players.
Some of these functions were thought to be impossible or very hard to do in a MMORPG, with thousands of players. But they announce that they take the challenge. As an example, the current housing system only allows you to build a house in a vacant spot, grow crops in the yard, decorate the interior of the house, and so on; however in the future, this system is to become the core base of crafting, politics and economy.
They are developing fundamental things, and still, alot is to be acomplished. For example - means of transportation. They have alot of plans about it, but in the first beta test, there will be just one way to transport yourself. And even that one way will be bugged :).
Usually, closed beta test means that the game is almost finished. This is not the case in ArcheAge. They have developed the games basics, and are launching the closed beta to listen to the player's reviews, thoughts, feelings. They have also said, that even tho they released so small amount of information, the players are waiting for a supernova or something, the devs are afraid, that the game wont meet the expectations of most people. As the developers say, the game is FAR FAR FAR away from completed, and can make a bad impression during the 1st closed beta test. They have Boldsized said that the combat system is far from being finished, and nothing is optimized, finished, complete, or 100% sure in the combat system.

Screenshots from the game:
Old official screenshots

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