This is subject to change although the following features will most likely make it into the final game.
- Language
Athea will be localized in English and French. - Shards (game servers)
The game is developed as a network of 64 players servers, just like the first Althea was, and focuses on player interactions and role-playing. Players will get to know each other and share the same adventures. Different shards will host different communities, making it easy to find like-minded players. Solo play is a viable option. - Crafting
Albeit optional, crafting is a cornerstone of the game and features extremely developed mechanics. Long gone is the time spending hours hitting rocks to get some ore, each crafting skill requires player interactivity and is designed to be enthralling all over the career of the crafter thanks to micro-management mechanics. - Artifacts and relics
Unique is the key word. Crafting a weapon will yield excellent results and common magical items will be enough for all of the content but rare artifacts and relics will exist in only one copy and will yield unique powers. Players will be distinguishable from the gear they wear. The only way to acquire the most powerful items will be through questing, trade – or less recommendable interactions. If a player doesn’t connect to the server for too long, his relics will return to the world. - Interactive quests
There will be no quest givers with a big fat yellow exclamation mark above their head. The players trigger quest events as they wander through the world so the quests are dynamically handled to the player, step after step. This ensures that the world is talking to the player so the player takes part into the world story instead of following a trail he never controls. - Dungeon crawling
To defeat dungeons, several skills will come into play, observation, puzzle solving, clever use of skills and good old hack and slash. Sometimes, players will face overwhelming challenges, in which case they will have the opportunity to spend adventure points, gained from exploration and questing, to get clues and help to overcome a dungeon so nobody ever gets stuck unable to complete a run. - Boss fights
Unreal Engine provides all the needed tools to program boss fights in a scalable way, which means combats will require from 1 to 10 players and will scale dynamically. - Skills
Skills will have to be discovered or researched, only the simplest skills will be readily handed to the players.
Skills will rely on physical or mental abilities: strength, wisdow, agility, intelligence, stealth, etc. The more players will focus on an ability the more powerful their skills will be using that ability. It is thus quite feasible to wield a sword and board while casting arcane missiles, nor the missiles neither the blows will be formidable since versatilty comes at a cost.
In a nutshell, you can master any competence you like, the more different those competences are, the harder they will be to master. - Skill sets
Skills will be many, too many to fit a cast bar. Some skills will be permanent, especially trade skills but most combat skills will have to be chosen amongst all those the player will have discovered throughout the world. That system allows to customize how a character plays which will come in handy especially in groups where players will be able to specialize into a role instead of being the typical swiss-knife a solo player has to be. - Classes
There will be no pre-defined classes. Players will choose whatever skills they want to define their personality by themselves. - Wear and tear
Online RPGs require either items to break or players’ level to be reset so they have to start all over again from the beginning also known as ‘new expansion grind’. Althea is going the wear and tear route; weapons can break, which means they have to be repaired and eventually replaced, and magic items run out charges, which means they have to be replaced or recharged. Wear and tear ensures players can run all the content often to replace or recharge their gear, which is the only viable way for a small studio to provide infinite content. And the most fun too, especially if the content changes according to the player’s achievements. - Player versus player
PvP, although optional, will be balanced and consensual which has always been a major concern since the inception of Althea. - Treasure hunts
Creatures can drop treasure maps which have to be deciphered to find the location of the treasure chest, dig it up, fight its defenders and loot it. A twenty years old mechanic which never gets old! - Player run vendors
Players can rent a merchant at the marketplace, yet another reason to have sharded worlds since MMORPGs must rely on auction houses to accommodate for thousands of players trying to buy and sell stuff. A limited number of merchants allows for a realistic economy where players can make a name for themselves and build a clientele. - Player housing
The world will be filled with hundreds of decoration items to make each house unique. Players will be able to have the house of their dreams through a personalized request system. - Fiefs (strongholds)
The ultimate goal of the development is to give players the opportunity to attack, conquer and develop their own fiefs. This involves dealing in all medieval activities be it warfare, trade or even agriculture. This, of course, can only be achieved on a sharded game since the number of fiefs has to be limited. This is the latest stage of development and will not come with the first release for sure. - Free to play
No pay to play, even less pay to win, everybody gets the same game-play experience. Developing such a monster project is not free though and access to personalized housing and private merchants is linked to a monthly fee, the old Althea premium account concept.