Warhammer Online: Age of Reckoning Interview

Shacknews had the opportunity to chat with EA Mythic producer Lance Robertson about Warhammer Online: Age of Reckoning at this week's Comic-Con.
Q: What are you doing with quests and NPCs that you see as out of the ordinary?

A: There are all kinds of innovations. It's not just RvR for us, it's the PvE innovations too. We've got public quests, which are great dynamic stories done in groups that are going on in the world, and as you wander the world you come into areas where there are these activities going on, where these stories are happening. It's a collective example of "We're trying to beat this area."

In the game now, there's a giant in the game and you need to convert him to your side, to get him to help you out to beat the Dwarfs. As you come into the area, there are other people killing Squigs because the giant doesn't like Squig, then after that stage it becomes getting beer to get him drunk so he helps your side, then the giant goes and gets a giant bomb that he carries over to the Dwarf gate, and when he blows that open Dwarfs come out.

There are hundreds of these things in the game, where you come into the area and contribute with other people without being grouped. It's not the traditional, "I go to the NPC and put my blinders on." You get rewards for contributing, there are incentives to helping out, it builds community. If you take it to its logical extreme, we're going to have those things in the RvR areas, we're going to have those in the cities, so it's really interesting.