Only one more week remains for the Kickstarter of Shadowrun Online, and new details are revealed about character awareness.
Crowd-funded games seems to be the answer for indie developers. It lets them get the money they need to make the video games they love, and it helps boost attention to their product. Similarly, gamers familiar with an old IP might be excited to find a new game in their favorite franchise. For me, I’m really excited that the Shadowrun series will be returning to video games as an RPG (and not as the shooter that shall not be named), and so far the new details about the “world view layers” makes the game-world for Shadowrun Online sound exciting.
The basics of “world view layers” for Shadowrun Online is each character perceives the world differently from others. A street samurai might be able to determine what kind of cover provides the best protection, or where an enemy might have a weak spot in their armor to get critical hits. A hacker can see hidden nodes to jack into, and later find out where all the security devices lie in the area with the Augmented Reality interface. A mage can see life essences through walls or even detect “essence dead zones” on enemies to indicate where they might have cyberware, making them useful for detecting more soft spots on enemies.
When players combine their unique world-view with each other in Shadowrun Online, communication and tactical advantage become a necessity. The hacker could start by converting the hostile drones as allies, thus getting a surprise round on the enemies. The street samurai then aims and takes out heavily armored foes, making sure to avoid shooting at any cyberware limbs the mage tells him.
So far the Kickstarter campaign for Shadowrun Online has got over $250,000 USD, less than half of their target goal. Anyone that donates over $15 USD will get access to the closed beta for the game when its available. Only one more week remains for Shadowrun fans to play online – and not in a generic shooter game!
Find out more about the Kickstarter campaign for Shadowrun Online by visiting the Kickstarter Web site.
