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REMAIN IN LIGHT
Lyra Studios discusses their game Reclamation and the history of MMO's.
Now that Massive Multi Player gaming has become such a global phenomenon, it's time to look back on some of the veterans who really laid the foundation for the online worlds we know today. One of these originators was Brent Phillips who developed one of the first MMO's Underlight. Fresh out of MIT after pursuing a PhD in computer science, Philips began designing games for the first Playstation, but soon discovered that the console had too many limitations for the games he dreamed of actualizing.
The idea for his next move occurred to Phillips one day in 1995 while chilling out in a hot tub in Los Angeles. A lifelong fan of the original pen-and-paper Dungeons & Dragons, Phillips contemplated how he could maximize the experience and knowledge MIT and game development provided him. As the potential of both the internet and networking becoming more impressive day-by-day, Phillips saw an opportunity. With the technology and know-how at his fingertips, he considered how he could create a role-playing game in which he and his friends, who were either scattered or had day jobs, could participate remotely. Hence, Underlight was born.
Now, on the heels of MMO successes like World of Warcraft and Everquest II, Lyra Studios is planning a comeback with their upcoming game Reclamation which vastly builds on the concepts of their original MMO. With the technology, fluidity, and popularity of MMO's expanding exponentially, Lyra has created a game that will fully immerse players into a three-dimensional universe that takes their City of Dreams, first introduced in Underlight, to the next level. Like its predecessor, the destiny of the players and the plot of the game will be limited only by the community's imagination. LQGaming Services: recently chatted with Lyra Studios' Brent Phillips and Mark Salowitz about their history in MMO development, their new game Reclamation, and what's on the horizon for online gaming:
LQGaming Services:: For readers unfamiliar with the early days of MMORPG's, please tell us how Lyra Studios started and what it was all about? When or how did it first occur to you to transpose the traditional paper role-playing game to an online format?
Brent Phillips: Lyra Studios was actually born in a hot tub in Marina Del Ray in the summer of 1995. I had left Grad school at MIT where I was in the PHD program to found the Jamison-Gold Interactive agency with two partners. We did some great high-profile web design work including the launch of the Sony Playstation. However we quickly maxxed out the technical capabilities of the web and wanted to do more.
"We were all lifelong D&D players, and we believed that the combination of a first-person 3D graphics engine with networking would allow us to create a drop-in online roleplaying game that ran 24/7."
We were all lifelong D&D players, and we believed that the combination of a first-person 3D graphics engine with networking would allow us to create a drop-in online roleplaying game that ran 24/7. Remember that in 1995, this had never been possible before. The sudden ubiquity of the internet and the DirectX support of Win95 made this possible for the first time. Our goal was to bring the face to face experience of games like Dungeons and Dragons to the online world. As adults we found it really difficult to schedule the time to do the face to face games properly. So we though that we could create and online game that continuously ran, that people could drop in and play as they were able. So, we designed the online game that we wanted to play ourselves. Underlight represents an approximately 60% finished version of that game.
LQGaming Services:: Was the concept of an MMOG something you had mind when you first began studying Computer Science at MIT, or was it the logical conclusion after years of research and engineering?
Brent Phillips: It was a logical conclusion after spending years on research and development of internet technology. But I do remember an old piece of fiction in an old Dragon magazine about a shared online world. so for certain the archetype was out there, at least in fantasy fiction.
LQGaming Services:: What are the challenges in maitaining an open-ended MMORPG in an environment with the high-concept and intensely visceral MMOs of the last few years?
Mark Salowitz: I feel that the main challenge is balancing the expectations of the players who have so many different exposures and ideas of what they want a game to be, with GM and player-developed characters maintaining adherence to a core storyline. A vast majority of MMO games exist where the roleplaying is in the character pathing, and the players do or say whatever comes to mind. Ours is in the character's story. The ongoing challenge is the maintenance of a story-productive environment, instead of letting it devolve into discussions of last night's sport scores.
LQGaming Services:: In overseeing Underlight for so many years, you must have observed changes or trends in the community over time. What changes or trends stand out most to you, and do you feel there were any external factors that affected these trends?
Mark Salowitz: I think perhaps the most obvious difference is as we've aged, so have our players. Many of our core players started playing at 16-18, and are now in their mid 20's. We've had all ages represented, but it's this one bracket whose youthful vigor has been tempered over time into solid, sensible roleplayers who know how to spin a story. Of course, I credit a lot of our older players with years of roleplaying experience under their belts as being the true leaders. they really show the way to solid character development and portrayal. It's become a true community, and everyone plays their part.
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