E3 2012: Trion Demos Rift’s Storm Legion Expansion

The first major expansion to Rift will include a huge amount of new explorable content. You’ll get two new continents that essentially triple the landmass of Trion’s MMO, which is certainly impressive. It sounds like not every piece of that land will be stuffed with content – Trion is leaving room to add in more world events and other types of content with future post-expansion patches – but a majority of the new areas will feature things like quests, cities, dungeons and plenty of things to beat up.

The new territory is meant for high level players, so you’ll be following questlines across the added continents on your journey to the new level cap of 60. There aren’t many specifics available yet, but four new souls , one per calling, will be added through the expansion, as well as seven new dungeons, three raids, and a lot more content and collectibles.

You’ll also get capes, which aren’t just there to look fancy. They fit into an additional equip slot and come with statistical boosts, meaning equipping one will actually power up your character, not merely serve as a cosmetic item.

Though it seems Trion isn’t willing to divulge a lot of information yet, a few new areas were shown off, including vast dungeon spaces featuring impressive art design. Whirring gears embedded in the floor of a structure crackling with lightning were on display in one dungeon, and in another, plant structures stretched from ceiling to floor, and a mass in its center throbbed with heartbeat-like regularity, which was actually a pretty disturbing mix of human and non-human elements. It also highlighted how detailed Rift’s visuals still are, easily outclassing many other MMOs on the market.

By the far the most impressive thing shown off was a world boss that can be summoned into the public overworld. This gigantic enemy emerges from a cave in a dusty metropolis covered with fearsome armor and immediately starts attacking any in the area. You’ll need to work together with any other players that happen to be around, as well as likely call in some friends, to bring this guy down by targeting individual pieces of armor with your attacks. Depending on the order with which the armor pieces are knocked from the boss, his attack patterns will change, and Trion hopes these type of gameplay elements will keep players coming back and experimenting with different methods of attack.

A few unique mechanics be available on the battlefield, including special power ups and jump pads you can use to launch yourself across the boss’s path. After you knock off a few pieces of armor and watch them thud to the ground, the boss will move on from his initial zone of combat, climbing up over a bridge and eventually smashing down a wall. The way he interacts with the environment looks perfectly natural – when he slams a giant fist into a wall, the wall cracks. When he hits it again, it crumbles. The wall then opens up access to a new explorable area that will remain accessible for a limited time until the magic of MMO reset timers repairs the structure.

Even at this early stage, the sheer scale of the boss and chaos of the encounter seemed exciting, and if Trion builds more content like this into Storm Legion, the new territory could be especially interesting to explore. Expect Storm Legion to launch sometime this fall.



Source : ign[dot]com