E3 2002: GameSpy provides a Preview of / Update on PlanetSide, Sony/Verant's attempt to develop an online, multiplayer first-person shooter.
Sony Online Entertainment's PlanetSide made huge strides over the demo we played at last year's show, and it's becoming apparent that Sony might be able to figure out action gaming as well as they tackled online RPGs. The premise is short but sweet: PlanetSide is a first-person shooter set in a persistent world, where virtual armies of players will do battle in various terrains with various vehicles. Imagine Tribes II but on a global scale. Imagine a 24 hour war raging on the Internet, where your teammates will get to know you and where your achievements can allow you to command armies and more. It's an idea that others have tried (World War II Online leaps to mind), but PlanetSide might just turn the idea into a runaway hit.
Building the Perfect Soldier
When you join the massive game, character creation is a simple matter: you simply select which of the three warring factions you wish to belong to. It's like joining a massive team, one that you'll stick with permanently. From there, it's all a matter of skillz. As Creative Director Kevin McCann explained, "The actual player skill is never replaced by roleplaying skills." In other words, you'll be able to gain rank as you fight, but how straight you can shoot and how good you can aim will always be based on your own abilities, not some RPG convention. This is an action game at heart, not an RPG.
That being said, the persistence of the world will still allow you to earn bonuses for good play. As you help your team by killing the enemy or capturing installations, you get "vocation points" that you can apply to specific development areas. Think of them as licenses to use special armor and equipment. These will allow your character to specialize -- only players with lots of development points spent for healing will be able to carry medical packs to heal teammates. Similarly, only players with piloting licenses will be able to fly the warships. Of course, even at the highest levels, you'll never be able to master everything; you'll have to specialize your character and work closely with other players.
But PlanetSide never locks the player into a certain path. If you decide you're tired of certain specialties, you can de-allocate the points you've earned and allocate them elsewhere without penalty. "You never take a step back," McCann claimed. The same is true of player death; you don't lose any experience, you only lose the equipment you were carrying, which is easily replaced (there are no unique or rare items). The other penalty for dying is that you have to respawn at the last base you tied yourself to, which may mean you're removed from the front lines until you can find a way back.
A Massive World for a Massive Game
The world of PlanetSide is divided into enormous "continents," the largest of which are 8 kilometers by 8 kilometers large. Each continent is seamless with no load time for any area within the continent. Terrain varies from landmass to landmass and within each landmass itself -- they've got desert, forest, grassland, arctic and even lava terrains to explore (among others.) Terrain plays an important role. For instance, some forests are too thick to effectively drive vehicles through, meaning infantry will have to go in alone. The designers are using effects like these to really sculpt the maps -- for example, certain fortresses will be surrounded by forests, meaning only infantry will be fighting there.
The aforementioned fortresses are scattered among the terrain and they're the focus of much of the combat. Each fortress is a large affair with indoor and outdoor rooms as well as defense towers and turrets (turrets are automated, although players can man the turrets to increase their aim and effectiveness.) Each base is "owned" by a specific team, and the colors of the base reflect ownership. By infiltrating a base and holding the control room, players can conquer it. This will allow them use that base as a respawn point. More importantly, each base has its own unique "bonus" to offer the team in charge: Faster respawn time, or ability to build a powerful vehicle, for instance.
Groups of players can get together to liberate one base after another, conferring benefits to their teammates and glory to themselves. Viva le red people! Down with ... the blue people! Keep in mind that the game is persistent, though. So you may go to bed having taken over half a continent, only to find that it's been retaken by the enemy while you slept.
Graphically the areas are simply gorgeous. Random ground clutter such as waving grass is present, of course. But more stunning is the huge architecture or terrain features. The forest I mentioned above was as thick as something you'd see on the moon of Endor. Soldiers popped out from behind enormous trees that filled the view from foreground to horizon. Shooter fanatics are in for some hardcore action, no doubt. The teleporter gates that link one continent to another are also enormous affairs, large enough that a hundred men could simultaneously walk through each one. These towering metal structures arc toward the heavens, dwarfing the men and vehicles that may come pouring through them at any time.
The vehicles are rendered with just as much love as the environment. About 15 vehicles are planned for the final version, everything from nimble dune buggies to massive tanks to VTOL fighter jets and more. The largest vehicle is the dropship, which can carry a pilot (who has to first earn his license) and up to 12 passengers. Many heavy vehicles require separate gunners, so teamplay is an absolute must. "The community aspect is very important," agreed McCann.
Will You Have What It Takes?
Although the game emphasizes skill, you won't need to be a first-person shooter God to enjoy the experience. There are plenty of support positions that can contribute to the overall team effort. Manning a base turret is easy and fun, given the firepower at your disposal. Also, a medic doesn't have to be a good shot to be a key part of the assault. Medics can heal players and even bring them back to life from a fatal injury to save them the trouble of respawning. You can also gain points as a commander, which will allow you to stay in the base and issue order to your squads -- you'll get credit for their accomplishments. You can even just pilot a small fighter around on patrol and report the locations of incoming enemies. "We don't want to limit the game to twitch gamers or good gunners," McCann said. "We're not just catering to hardcore players." Because the game encourages intense teamwork, good players and good team leaders will begin to stand out and squads of friends will hopefully start to work together on a regular basis. As McCann describes, "We're giving players a lot of control as to how they want to attack these continents."
If all goes well, you can expect to see PlanetSide hitting retail sometime around March or April of 2003. A minimum system spec of a Pentium 3 running at 1-GHz with a GeForce 2 is recommended, given the amount of on-screen action.
PlanetSide is massive in every way: massive in scope, massive in players, and massive in potential. Will it be the next wave in action gaming? Our only regret is that we'll have to wait until 2003 to find out!
Posted by justin at October 21, 2002 05:52 PM