ParaWorld Hands-On - Single-Player, Dinosaurs, and Armies

OK. Let's get one thing straight: ParaWorld isn't a game about a planet full of parachutists. Instead, this upcoming real-time strategy game from Sunflowers and SEK could probably best be thought of as Dinotopia meets Warcraft. And if you thought dinosaurs were cool, wait until you see dinosaurs with machine guns mounted on their backs. Toss in a picturesque graphics engine, and it's no wonder that Sunflowers has high hopes for the game.

ParaWorld takes its name from the fact that it takes place on a parallel world to Earth. As the game's story goes, a 19th-century scientist discovers the method for traveling to another dimension, where dinosaurs and primitive human tribes still inhabit Earth. When he and his companions discover that they don't ever age in this dimension, they decide to remain there to rule. Now flash-forward to the modern age, where three young scientists discover the dimension-jumping method for themselves. Inevitably, they're soon trapped in a hostile world where they have to use their wits to survive.

The three scientists serve as your core "hero" units, and you'll control them as they go through the game trying to figure out how to get home. This may involve trying to find the pieces of a crashed airship, which means defeating the native tribes that possess them (believing them to be holy relics), or battling hostile dinosaurs and the forces of the 19th-century scientists who settled there long ago. There are 50 different species of dinosaurs in the game, all scientifically accurate, and the dinos can come in friendly and not-so-friendly types. The dinos, as well as other animal species, can be tamed and used as units. For example, the female scientist rides a saber-tooth tiger, while some of the larger dinosaurs can be used as transport units. You can place archers or mortar men on top of these larger dinosaurs to make them mobile weapon platforms. Meanwhile, some of the smaller dinos can carry weapons of their own, including Gatling guns.

There are three human tribes that you can battle or ally with, each with its own unique strategies. The Norsemen are a Viking-like warrior race, whereas the Dragon Clan is inspired by Japanese civilization, with its sumo warriors (a cross between a sumo wrestler and a samurai warrior), gunpowder units, and more. And the third clan, the Dust Riders, is an African-themed faction that specializes in offense.

We had the chance recently to check out a mission taken from the middle part of the game, and from what we saw, ParaWorld looks like it should have a lot of depth for real-time strategy fans. For example, perhaps the most interesting new gameplay innovation in ParaWorld is what's dubbed the "army controller," which is a panel on the left-hand side of the screen that lets you control every unit in your army. However, the army controller is much more than that, as it also will force you to make strategic decisions on the composition of your army. That's because there are only 52 slots on the army controller, which is the maximum number of units you can build. Those 52 slots are divided into ranks, and there are 25 first-tier slots, 15 second-tier, eight third-tier, three fourth-tier, and only one fifth-tier slot. As you accumulate experience in the game, you can promote units up to the next slot, assuming there's room. Regular units will become more powerful, while hero units will gain extra new powers and will grant bonuses to other units, depending on the hero. But since there are only a limited number of slots, you have to carefully weigh which units to include your army, as well as which units to promote. You can also use experience to "age up" your tribe, much like you could "age up" your nation in Rise of Nations. This lets you unlock new types of buildings, units, and technologies, and it represents the scientific know-how that the scientists possess.

Of course, it also helps that the game looks really good, and ParaWorld uses a brand-new proprietary graphics engine that's quite impressive. There's a rich amount of detail on units and buildings, and the dinos, in particular, look great. The same goes for the environments, as there's a sheer lushness to the world that makes ParaWorld feel less like a game and sometimes more like a painting. The game will have an accelerated day/night cycle, and you can see real-time shadows moving across the ground as the sun passes overhead. There will also be five climactic zones with their own flora and fauna, such as jungle, snowy ice wastes, lava lands, and more.

Sunflowers says that ParaWorld will have standard multiplayer modes, such as deathmatch and team deathmatch, as well as a new mode dubbed defender, though details aren't available regarding that quite yet. Still, ParaWorld looks like an interesting game, and we're looking forward to learning more. The game has been in development for approximately three years, but the end is in sight, as Sunflowers is currently aiming to ship the game in the first quarter of next year.