Project: Gorgon - a retro MMO from devs behind Asherons Call and Everquest

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Project Gorgon on Kickstarter

Play an early alpha version for free.

Official website.

Dev Q&A.

Project Gorgon is a new Massively Multiplayer Online Game brought to you by Eric Heimburg and his wife Sandra Powers. Eric Heimburg, Project Gorgon creator and lead developer, has over a decade of experience working as a Senior and Lead Engineer, Developer, Designer and Producer on successful games such as Asheron’s Call 1 and 2, Star Trek Online and other successful Massively Multiplayer Online Games. Sandra also has extensive experience working as a Producer on Asheron’s Call 1, Asheron’s Call: Throne of Destiny, EverQuest II, and EverQuest II: Echoes of Faydwer.

I've been playing this for the last week and while it's still a very early (and ugly) version of the game, it's already an absolutely fantastic sandbox rpg packed with tons of interesting features and skills. There are no classes and no levels, you learn skills by doing- grab a weapon and start hitting things and you'll get better at using it, doing more damage and learning different attacks. Grab a knife and you can skin animals for crafting materials, butcher them for meat, or perform autopsies to learn how they died and how to be more effective at killing them. Get killed yourself and learn how to better avoid death in the future. Get turned into a cow and learn how to become better at being a cow (seriously, there's a cow skill).

  • If you're on fire, you can jump in a lake to put it out. That kind of real world touch can have a subtle effect on your strategies – especially when you’re fighting a fire mage!
  • You can drop items on the ground, and other players can pick them up. What's so great about that? Imagine laying down a trail of literal (virtual) breadcrumbs to lure one of your friends into the woods.
  • Shopkeepers really keep inventory, so you can buy the items other players sold them. Want to help out the newbies? Sell your cast-off uber weapons to the shopkeep in the newbie zone and watch them go to town.
  • Each non-player character (NPC) you meet has their own goals and interests, and rewards players that choose to be their friend.
  • You can inscribe messages on items, write books, even leave notes for other players. Make your name as an in-game poet, or just record your best kills on your sword.
  • You can discover "words of power" and then say them in chat to activate their magic.
  • Skills are all intertwined in interesting ways. Want to be the best swordsman ever? Practice your calligraphy to get better hand-eye coordination with the sword!
  • A unique dual death-penalty system. Explore the world without fear of death, but when it comes time to fight boss monsters, you'd better take it seriously!
  • Want a scarier game? Customize your death penalty. Why should a game only have one death penalty, anyway?!
  • "Behavior badges" recognize what you do in game. Want to be a vegetarian? Okay, just don't eat meat! Pacifist? Fine. Refuse to wear helmets? Sure, okay. The game recognizes these things, and many others. Players can see it on your character sheet. You don't get anything special for it -- just recognition of your choices.
  • Battle Chemistry: Create huge explosions! Inject yourself with mysterious mutagens! Program a pet golem!
  • Unarmed Combat: Grapple and control enemies using a situational-aware combo system that varies based on where you are and even what day it is.
  • Animal Handling: Tame animals and train them to become ferocious fighters. Then breed your best and sell their offspring to other players!
  • Necromancy: Seek out corpses and graveyards to raise your army. No graveyard around? Well... there's always the corpses of your friends...
  • You can learn as many skills as you can get your hands on... but sometimes, power comes with down sides.
  • You can become infected with lycanthropy and gain access to very powerful skill sets. Roam the world in a pack and wreak havoc! But come the three days surrounding the full moon (the real-world full moon!) you'll be stuck in your beast form. New opportunities come open, but others close. There is no cure for lycanthropy.
  • Becoming a druid gives you great power, but you have to vow to drop everything when there's a natural emergency, be it a forest fire, a monster invasion, even just an insect pest. And nature doesn't let you shirk your duties. Ever.
  • Summoning arch-demons also has a down side... well, you get the idea. Characters slowly become defined by the choices you make and responsibilities you accept.
  • Taking this idea to another level, you can unlock special playable races, each with their own pros and cons.

Most of that stuff (and lots more that isn't listed) is already in the alpha version of the game. The kickstarter is mostly focusing on updating the graphics and art assets, fleshing out existing skills, and adding some more complex systems like player housing and guild functionality. The devs have said that the game will be buy-to-play upon release, but will have an optional subscription model that will reward subscribers with in-game currency they can use to buy cosmetic items and mounts.

Coincidentally, Massively just released this week's podcast episode and it features an interview with Eric Heimburg from Project Gorgon.

It looks like a spiritual successor to Asheron's Call.
The graphics actually wouldn't be that bad if it weren't for the garish armor dyes.
No amount of texture work is going to make neon red and green look fashionable.

This has a ton of things (most things) i want in an MMO. Yet the thing that turned me on to Asheron's Call instead of EQ back in the day was the graphics. I dont think i can handle looking at that ugly sh*t on the screen.

I'd still play AC if it looked and controlled better because it's still a fun and more exciting MMO than some current ones

I have been playing this for close to a week now and am enjoying it. I listened to the podcast yesterday and it even raised my hopes for the game when it is ready for release. I like the fact that it is going to be PVE only. That may turn many off but I am a carebare and enjoy PVE over PVP. Back in the DAOC days I jumped to Gaheris when they opened up that server. Anyway, I just find it refreshing to be able to explore a MMO world without having my hand held each step of the way. I told a friend of mine the otherday that the gameplay kind of reminds me of the MMO world Elder Scroll fans were hoping for instead of ESO.

Was Gaheris the "co-op" server? The one where the factions were friendly? I really enjoyed that. My favorite was bringing a Necro into Hybernia.

I thought this was one of those mega-hardcore FFA PVP with corpse looting.
Maybe I just heard sandbox and assumed the rest.
I did see mention of a configurable death penalty. It really sounds interesting.
I also like that death is a "skill" that you get "better" at the more you do it.

I should definitely back this.

Yup, count me interested.

Yup, Gaheris is where all the PVE players went to when the server opened up.

yeah - downloading the alpha as we speak, and backed the kickstarter.

I downloaded the alpha, and was able to get into a character, but was not able to select things or actions by clicking. Otherwise, the keyboard and mouse worked.

I'll try again today.

I backed it. Just because i want more games like this made. Graphics annoy the hell outta me.

Wow, this really brings back the old school vibe.

I found a guy who teaches magic. I had to buy a staff from him, and some table salt to use for spells, and now I need to learn how to research fire spells. He'll teach me, for 250 gold. My sword is worth 25 gold, and I have nine left after buying the staff... So I need to go hunting.

Meanwhile, I've got beginner's skills in sword, unarmed, mushrooms and a few other things.

Robear wrote:

Wow, this really brings back the old school vibe.

I found a guy who teaches magic. I had to buy a staff from him, and some table salt to use for spells, and now I need to learn how to research fire spells. He'll teach me, for 250 gold. My sword is worth 25 gold, and I have nine left after buying the staff... So I need to go hunting.

Meanwhile, I've got beginner's skills in sword, unarmed, mushrooms and a few other things.

Spoiler:

There's another guy in town that helps you with money. He gives you like 1k along with some quests that gives you more gear and skills. Also make sure you kill all the chickens and animals you can because the meat adds up quickly and they sale for like a minimum of 10g each.

edit:

Spoiler:

Also he tells you how to go about training the skills, and you can learn up to 5 skills per training book.

This game is truly a lot of fun! Just so fugly.

Robear wrote:

Wow, this really brings back the old school vibe.

I found a guy who teaches magic. I had to buy a staff from him, and some table salt to use for spells, and now I need to learn how to research fire spells. He'll teach me, for 250 gold. My sword is worth 25 gold, and I have nine left after buying the staff... So I need to go hunting.

Meanwhile, I've got beginner's skills in sword, unarmed, mushrooms and a few other things.

Fire magic is probably the most expensive combat skill to level early on since you have to craft all the spells in order to learn them and the mats aren't particularly common. I'm still working on getting the second tier of spells myself.

There's a lot of stuff in the tutorial cave, both items and skills, that are useful to pick up. Some of the stuff requires farming favor with the npc's or beating some tougher monsters, so you shouldn't fall into thinking that once you leave the cave, you are "done" with it.
For example:

Spoiler:

the npc Lawara will give you a skinning knife if you reach "friends" favor with her, this lets you skin most enemies and butcher most non-monster enemies. Selling the mats you get for skinning/butchering is one of the best ways of getting money early on. Also, the npc Tyler Green will give you the "shield" skill if he likes you enough. As far as I know this is the only place to get that skill.

Hmm, I can't use the launcher icon? It says its not supported for my version of windows? Win8 64 bit?

Razgon wrote:

Hmm, I can't use the launcher icon? It says its not supported for my version of windows? Win8 64 bit?

That's a weird one... I'm on Win10 64 bit without an issue.

I ran it on win 8.1 64 bit with no issues.

ranalin wrote:

This game is truly a lot of fun! Just so fugly.

Fugly I can handle. I gotta take this thing for a spin sometime.

Project Gorgon has been kicking around for a few years. There were at least two previous kick starters that didn't hit their goal, so glad to see the third time is the charm, and its getting some attention.

Just downloaded the alpha. Going to try it out for the weekend and see if it is something will go for long term. I like the idea of leveling skills by using them. It would be neat if not using a skill causes it to decay (slowly).

Plavonica mentioned this to game to me and omfg I am loving it (or hating that I love it). It scratches that Old EQ itch that I have been missing for so long. No hand holding, craptastic graphics it seriously reminds me of EQ post Shadows of Luclin graphics... which was an upgrade for EQ at the time, sh*tty animations and sounds. I can't put it down (unless the server crashes).

Kickstarted! Can't wait for release. 1.5 years to go!

I just started playing. Are guilds implemented yet and do we have one?

Some players have created ad hoc guilds using the friends list in the game, but proper guild functionality hasn't been added yet.

If anyone wants to friend up I'm usually in game as "Pond."

Speaking of which, I was trying to respond to your tell, Plav, but I kept getting errors in the chat window.

The game is *supposed* to support custom chat rooms. Type /join -gwj and we should be able to talk amongst ourselves (the "-" prevents the channel from being publicly searchable). Chat rooms don't appear to be persistant so we'll have to /join every time we login.

ruhk wrote:

The game is *supposed* to support custom chat rooms. Type /join -gwj and we should be able to talk amongst ourselves (the "-" prevents the channel from being publicly searchable). Chat rooms don't appear to be persistant so we'll have to /join every time we login.

Yea think that was implemented yesterday.

I'm in as Ranalin.

I came upon Plavonica standing outside the town this weekend, and said hello, but no response. My in-game name is "Taikuo".

ranalin wrote:
ruhk wrote:

The game is *supposed* to support custom chat rooms. Type /join -gwj and we should be able to talk amongst ourselves (the "-" prevents the channel from being publicly searchable). Chat rooms don't appear to be persistant so we'll have to /join every time we login.

Yea think that was implemented yesterday.

I'm in as Ranalin.

Ha I told Plav I had seen a character named "Ranalin" running around

I'll try to remember to join the chat room when I log in. I'm in the game as Einbjorn, have an alt named Mulette which I play for hang out timers that still need expiring too.

While there's many Ran... and at times even my stand by Ranakyn is used by others i've yet to see another Ranalin in 30 years of gaming.

I'm normally running around clueless till i remember a shiny and run off to take care of it.

I started off being annoyed about the dungeons, and that there were parts of all the dungeons ive been in that were impossible to get through.

That is until i remembered AC. Like some olthoi dungeons if you aggroed the wrong ones you were instantly dead, but could stand and fight the others if you were careful.

I've downloaded the Alpha yesterday and got in a couple hours of play, just enough to run through the starter caves a few times, and reach the first village outside. I really dig their approach to skills and leveling, and while the graphics are certainly outdated (with some jarring color schemes), it's not nearly enough to turn me off it. I expect I'll back them as well, if I don't forget before the kickstarter ends in a few days.
I'm in as Tamara, and will join the chatroom next time I'm on.

plavonica wrote:

My main character (Plavonica) has gotten good enough to lay down some good damage in the Crypts. I can't solo the bosses yet but I can see a time where I can later on. Then I'll be the one making necromancy and spider skills runs for lowbies to start on early.

I'm almost to that point as well, but found out i need to level some kind of non magic skill. I'm trying to to farm the hallway to the strange spider for ice cores. I'm wanting to learn Ice Magic at some point and those are the beginning reagents. Still i'm unable to do any damage to those evil looking deers. It's kinda embarrasing... i started off not even being able to make it to that hallway. Now i can go through and kill multiples mobs of the ice creatures and high level skeletons without running out of power. Yet get 'No Damage' messages against the deer and have to run away.

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