Vanguard: Saga of Heroes Preview

[GameBanshee News]

The guys at IGN PC have kicked up a two-page preview of Sigil Games' Vanguard: Saga of Heroes, after getting some hands-on time with the Unreal-powered fantasy MMORPG. Here's a bit to get you started:

Once you start racking up a lot of dough, you'll eventually have the resources to build your own house and you can create a list of specific people who are allowed to enter it. Housing is not instanced, but the world has tons of open space for staking your claim. You'll also eventually be able to buy a boat and sail pretty much wherever you want -- keeping in mind that the water ways have their own monsters lurking in the deeps. There's also a flying mount that will be available to the highest-level players. (Right now, the plan is to have a level cap of 50 at launch. With the current content balance, one beta tester took over four months, playing twelve hours a day, seven days a week, to reach that point.) Since Sigil is made up of gamers, pretty much everyone has a high level character, putting as much time into playtesting as they can, so these aren't arbitrary design decisions. That's primarily why McQuaid has a 30" Dell LCD powered by a Radeon X1900 XTX -- because they like to play. The team also plays World of Warcraft regularly, with at least one level 60 character per person. These people are all gamers at heart. Jeff Butler, the president of Sigil, has been playing pen-and-paper RPGs for thirty years now. You won't see a lot of corporate suits in the office.