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E3 2002: Shadowbane preshow report

Wolfpack Studios' MMORPG will be displayed at E3.

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Ubi Soft has recently announced that it plans to publish Shadowbane, the upcoming MMORPG from Wolfpack Studios. The game's primary focus is player vs. player combat, and the developers promise that it will do this concept justice in a number of ways. Many features in the game have been designed with the intent of providing players with the ability to enact war in a number of ways. You'll be able to lay siege to the settlements of enemies, and you'll also be able to form factions of various types--dependent on their character classes--in order to mobilize in less overt ways. You'll be able to build your own fortifications as well, ranging from taverns and guildhalls to fortresses and castles. Of course, these will be vulnerable to siege weaponry, as well as less overt manners of infiltration.

The game's story is suitable apocalyptic. A century before the game's outset, the elves and men fought a bitter war that veritably shattered Aerynth, Shadowbane's world. Not pleased by the acts of their children, Aerynth's gods forsook them, and the world's great empires slowly crumbled. Aerynth has since been plagued by an endless war. It's no secret that the end of the world is nigh, though the inhabitants know, similarly, that there is hope for salvation: the legendary sword Shadowbane.

Twenty classes and 10 races will be available to players, and Wolfpack promises a great deal of versatility in the class system itself. Furthermore, more than a dozen schools of magic will be available, and you'll be able to specialize in one of them as you progress through the game. These include summoning, wizardry, channeling, and psionics. There will be 13 types of guilds that you can found or join, including barbarian clans, mercenary companies, wizard towers, and thieves' dens, among others, and each of these organizations will have its own sorts of organizational structures and hierarchies.

As you're supposed to have a big impact on how the history of the world unfolds, Wolfpack is providing an application that captures in-game movies, allowing witnesses to key events in the world to capture them and share them with other players. Furthermore, a real-time reporting system will reportedly communicate vital gameworld information to Shadowbane's official site, as well as a host of developer-sanctioned fan sites.

We'll have more information on Shadowbane from the E3 show floor. Till then, check out our previous coverage of the game.

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