gamebunny carpe diem interview pg 1

Jon Latham of Persistent Worlds

Your attention please folks; there's an intriguing new medieval-fantasy MMO under-development out there called CARPE DIEM. The game currently seems to be floating just below the awareness radar and we'd like to do our little part to help change that situation. Hence this interview with Jon Latham of dev and pub house, Persistent Worlds.

CARPE DIEM seems to have a few refreshing new gameplay concepts planned and these tasty ideas are the focus of our exclusive chat. Seize the Q&A!

gamebunny:
Thanks so much for agreeing to tell us a bit more about Carpe Diem. Let’s start with a question on what first grabs the eye, the game’s graphics. The art style seems to be a mixture of medieval realism and cartoony Anime. It seems to work. Tell us a bit about the art team and how this style was decided upon.

Jon Latham (Persistent Worlds):
Thanks, we think it works well. (but then we are biased!).
In creative terms we wanted a game that looked totally different to everything else out there.

I feel at the moment that everyone is trying to get to photorealism, and therefore everyone is ending up looking the same (just take a look at screens of “Commandos: Strike Force” vs “Rainbow Six” for example). Don’t get me wrong, this can be beautiful - just like Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion. But photorealism is quite a high art to get to and costs a lot. The other problem with it is that the games will only play on top end machines. In choosing a different look, we gave Carpe Diem some personality of its own and it still plays on most machines, even if they are low spec. It was the big argument at the time between World of Warcraft and EQII and it does not appear to have done World of Warcraft any harm at all!

gamebunny:
The “Possession System”, whereby two players combine into one fighting unit sounds exciting and original. Describe how this actually works in-game.

Jon Latham:
The possession system is unique to Carpe Diem and allows two characters, the human and the fey, to work together as one. The human manoeuvres the characters around the game whilst the fey works her magic and casts the spells at the enemy. A bit like flying a world war II bomber where you have a pilot and a tail gunner doing the firing (if you get the analogy!)

gamebunny:
Much focus is placed on player mounts, which seems like a good idea (I love my various mounts in other games). Can you elaborate a bit on mounts having their own character development? How much is there in the way of mount skills and customization?

Jon Latham:
A lot! The first part of the game involves finding your mount, training them up and customizing the armour. Each character has their own type of mount. The humans have horses, the fey have armoured bears and the dragonbloods have ferocious bull type beasts. The mounts themselves have their own skill systems and fighting styles (Its great seeing armoured bears throwing boulders at your enemy). But beware if you don’t look after your mount they will die.

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