Genre: MMORPG
Publisher: Eidos Interactive
Developer: Funcom
Release Date: May 2008

For anyone out there who may have grown tired of World of Warcraft (don't laugh, there are at least a couple of you out there), Eidos is attempting to break into the MMO market with their forthcoming title, Age of Conan: Hyborian Adventures. With this offering, the developers are promising a unique yet familiar MMO experience and a character creation system that will make Oblivion blush.

Players assume the identity of an unnamed, unimportant galley slave, who escapes his fate due to a shipwreck. Once ashore, you select a character from one of three different races, and then a score of sliders allows you to tweak eyebrows, cheekbones and everything in between. The developers' ultimate goal is to create a system in which every character is so unique that you can recognize your friends by the sight of their faces rather than by reading nametags.

One area where Eidos is breaking away from convention is delaying the game's multiplayer aspect for quite a long time. For your character's first 20 levels, this is a purely single-player affair. The team is hoping that in structuring the game this way, nearly all players will be ready to jump into the massive dungeon raids and city sieges that the full game experience requires. It's a novel approach, but the question is whether pure MMO fans tolerate 20 levels of isolation, and will new gamers keep going once they have to take on a big, bad world of level 50 berserkers who can wipe them out in an instant?

Combat itself requires a bit more strategy than some similar games, due to the fact that most enemies have the ability to create moving shields, and all players and enemies take up physical space. For example, if you run up against a foe in a small hallway and he throws up a shield, it will be exceptionally difficult to defeat him unless your main melee fighters find a way to work themselves around him and attack his unguarded flank. Of course, this is nearly impossible if the baddie takes up the entire hallway and there is no discernable way to slip past. It creates an added layer of strategy where positioning and character location is more important than ever.

In addition to standard dungeon raids, the developers are also promising massive city sieges, which will require a lot of manpower and some heavy artillery to break through. This is one area where the mounts come in handy, as you can not only ride the traditional horse, but also mammoths and, in an homage to "300," war rhinos. These battles promise to be epic in scale, and it will take vast resources and huge armies in order to bring down the walls.

The title is being built using the Dreamworld engine, and its utilization allows for very lush and detailed landscapes. The game is based on the literary works of Robert E. Howard, and the rich mythology he has built shines through the decaying ruins and overgrown jungles. Also, the engine allows for some terrifically brutal combat, with heads flying and blood flowing liberally. Make no mistake, this title is going to earn every bit of its M rating.

Age of Conan: Hyborian Adventures is promising a lot, but it remains to be seen if it can make a dent in the armor of WoW. The deep character creation, coupled with the unique single-player startup offers a little something for everyone. What remains to be seen is if gamers will glom onto the unique aspects of the title, or if it will be remembered in a noble effort to dethrone World of Warcraft.