Some years ago, developer Artifact Entertainment announced Horizons, an ambitious massively multiplayer game that was to include new features that had never been seen before in an online role-playing game. Among other things, the game was to feature an enormous world, a third of which was underwater (and habitable only by water-dwelling player races), as well as playable dragon characters. In recent years, there have been changes at the company and in the game's focus. A lot of the more outlandish features (like the underwater areas) have been scrapped.

This fearsome undead creature is looking forward to Horizons. Are you?

However, the developer has tried to hold on to as many interesting ideas as possible, and it is using them with a game engine that lets you create distinctive-looking characters who can wear many layers of clothing and armor. We last saw Horizons in motion at E3 2002, where we had a look at the game's good-looking graphics and its "secondary geometry"--the 3D representations of animated, solid objects for special effects, like an impressive tornado magic spell. We also saw that Horizons will still feature playable dragon characters, though we were only able to view dragons at a great distance. What adventures and quests can we expect from Horizons' colorful fantasy world? What about the game's trade skills and social elements? And, most importantly, what will the dragons be like? We sat down with Artifact Entertainment co-president David Bowman and producer Steve Snow and discussed these and other questions.

GameSpot: Thanks for taking the time for this interview. As we saw and heard at E3, Horizons has been through some pretty radical changes--the underwater areas and races from the original design have been cut, for instance, as have the story and background ties to Artifact's previous game, Demise. What would you say are the biggest changes that have been made to Horizons since its original design was drafted?

David Bowman: We have taken many of the ideas from the original drafts and evaluated them in light of the technology and the company's goals. The result is a realizable design that solves many of the problems in existing massively multiplayer games and provides new experiences that no other technology will match.

The single biggest change would be the focus of the product on the player's interaction with the dynamic environment and the computer-controlled opponents. We would not be able to say that if we were still splitting our attention between player vs. player gameplay and player interaction with the environment. When we release our player vs. player product, it will be the number-one product of its type.

Steve Snow: Another big direction change that's been made to Horizons is increasing the ease of play. We are streamlining our systems to support intuitive conclusions as to how things work and interact with one another.

GS: As we saw at E3, even though players will create and play as a single character at a time, as in other online RPGs, Horizons will allow for a great deal of customizability, even in a character's appearance. Can you discuss how the Horizons engine will let players layer clothing and armor on their characters? Are there any plans to allow players to import their own art, such as guild emblems, into the game?

Horizons will let players customize their characters' appearance.

DB: Our client technology provides a theoretically infinite number of layers of player-worn items. Characters can have a brightly colored shirt that shows up under an extruded breastplate with just the edge of their new tattoo showing on their forearm. Of course, all these items are character-created items crafted using trade skills and resources. Player-created textures would need to be approved before being allowed into the game, but that is currently within the plans for the product.

SS: The only limitations on this system are the ones that we stipulate. You can do some really interesting things here, but we will provide some guides for the users, such as tattoos only drawing over skin, not clothing and armor.

GS: Can you discuss Horizons' use of polygonal geometry (in addition to standard effects, like particle trails) for its special effects, such as the tornado spell? Are there any plans to let player characters affect the actual physical world of Horizons--for instance, by destroying part of a mountain or hollowing out a crater in the ground?

DB: Artifact's developers have combined their programming and artistic skills to produce the most fantastic spell effects in any game. The particle system is robust and extensible, and combined with the fully animated secondary geometry, it produces spectacular effects. Real-time permanent deformation of the world's geometry is possible and will be permitted, but it needs to be strictly controlled to prevent characters from producing inadvertent results. A great deal of control is available to players over their owned property, including changes in geometry.

SS: Stepping away from polygons and terrain specifically, let's discuss the ability for players to own plots of land and build structures. We'll place plots to prevent haphazard placement of buildings. But having multiple players building a town, or even a city, is possible and a goal of ours. Once a town is established, it becomes a part of the world, and it shows up on maps, links to the transit system, and performs all the other basic functions of a normal town. This also means that the town opens up to assaults from monsters, which is one of the really exciting things for me, personally.