A month ago, we covered a new sandbox MMORPG under development by MIR Cybernetics Corporation: Galaxies of Eden. It’s absurdly ambitious, with an alpha planned for early 2022 and a social-gameplay-friendly features list as well as obvious homages to Star Wars Galaxies. And as we noted, the game isn’t asking for money just yet.
MIR has now updated its website with its first dev blog, homing in on the game’s combat modes. “Over the past few years, we’ve noticed a shift in the MMORPG genre,” the devs says. “Older, more traditional MMORPGs opted for a slower pace of combat where user’s would point and click on each ability then wait a few seconds see the result, whereas most current MMORPG titles have become increasingly action oriented.” MIR argues that slower-paced tab-target games are better for accessibility as well as for non-combat classes, while action gameplay is better with controls more suited for it. The solution? The game is doing both in the form of an “Action Mode / Social Mode switch system.” Social mode functions like a “classic MMORPG.” And as for Action Mode…
“Players can switch to Action Mode by pressing a single key and similarly toggle it off when they want to switch back to Social Mode. This switch can be done regardless of what the player was already doing. You could be in the middle of performing a complicated dance routine, and pull out a rifle to fend off rabid wildlife. We’ve built Action Mode to be a first-class-citizen in Galaxies of Eden. That isn’t to say that Social Mode isn’t just as important – just that we’re not throwing Action mode in as an afterthought. With Action mode, Galaxies of Eden has a bonafied third-person-shooter feel. Weapons have recoil, spread, and even those small, important details like floating combat text adjust themselves to make the best use of fast-paced Action Mode.”
The dev blog also goes in-depth on the game’s active and passive skills, noting that skills are capped at 100 points and players get 200 points to spread around. “[M]ost of the end-game content can be completed with only one skill at 100,” MIR says. It hopes to balance the system with loadouts and class combinations that again is going to look familiar to fans of old-school sandboxes; it’ll also attempt to balance skills to perform differently in PvE and PvP.
“As a small indie company, we can’t promise you the moon and the stars,” the studio concludes. “It is physically impossible for us to deliver an AAA level game at this stage, so please don’t be disappointed if your AAA dreams aren’t visible in our alpha stage. Nevertheless, MMORPGs are constantly improved upon as they are service based games, and we will constantly keep improving Galaxies of Eden throughout the development. We have a solid plan to raise the game from indie status to AA level. It’ll be a long journey, though, so temper your expectations on timing.”
