Hellgate: London Q&A

GameSpot has posted a two-page Q&A with Flagship Studios CEO Bill Roper about the team's upcoming action RPG, Hellgate: London.
Q: The big news over the past couple of weeks is, of course, the introduction of the new hunter faction. Could you tell us a bit more about the class specifically? How does it compare to the existing cabalist and templar classes?

A: The hunter faction is designed to appeal to the first-person shooter-style player--someone that wants to be fully immersed in the world and battle demons with high-tech weaponry and gadgets. While the templars focus mainly on melee combat and holy rituals and the cabalists use the powers of the demons against them through magical rites, the hunters use bleeding-edge tech to fight for mankind's freedom.

The hunter faction appeals to FPS players in several ways. First and foremost, since they primarily use all ranged weapons, they are best played in first-person mode. Secondly, player skill is a factor as we eliminate the autolock and soft-targeting features that the templar and cabalist use. Hellgate: London is a role-playing game, however, so level, skills, and equipment do matter. The player who chooses a hunter, however, will gain benefits from having a degree of personal FPS skills.