We've just spent twenty minutes getting a demo of NCSoft's and Richard Garriott's latest game, Tabula Rasa, from Starr Long (Producer) and Carly Staehlin (Content Producer). The game has been in development for three years now, and when they started out they decided they wanted to do something a bit different. They wanted everyone to be a hero in their game. So they looked at single player games and deconstructed them, broke them down into the componants that made them good and made them bad. Then taking only the good parts they set out to make a massively multiplayer game, that game is Tabula Rasa.

We started off by being shown your house and the hub, both of which are 100% safe, and nothing can hurt you there. Everything in your house, the trees, furniture, rocks are all created by players, bought in shops or awarded as trophies or rewards for completing missions. You can also be rewarded pets and animals that live in and on the grounds around your house. Your house is instanced so there won't be any urban sprawl, but you will be able to invite your friends/guild in whenever you want too. The hubs will be where you go to craft, meet friends, start missions etc.

There will be PvP in the game, but it will be more like a miliatary excercise instead of open warfare, as all the players in the game are on the same side in the storyline. Instead, players will form a team, red verses blue for example and go at it. So there will be 'games' you can play such as capture the flag or a Gauntlet where you have waves of monsters coming at you.

One of the biggest things NCSoft have done, is what they call "dramatic impression." To quote Starr, "If you think of every other entertainment genre on the planet they use dramatic impression. What that means is, in a movie, if someone takes a train from New York to Chicago, you don't watch them on the train for three hours." They've taken this idea and put it into Tabula Rasa. Meaning if you want to meet up with your friends, you can, and you can teleport instantly to them, instead of someone having to wait around and do nothing. Travel is always instant in public space, so don't expect much downtime, unless you want it.

Tabula Rasa will be using instanced dungeons or missions which allows them to have events happen within the mission that will effect you. For example, there may be a door you need to get through. If the mission wasn't instanced that door would almost always be open and you'd have a queue of people passing through it, waiting to camp the boss or loot at the end of the mission. In an instanced mission there is only yourself and any friends you brought with you there. So you get to play the hero, you get to break down that door, you get the kill the baddies and save the day. All missions will have various objectives, primary objectives will be doable by a solo player. Secondary objectives have no such rule though, and may only be achievable by a team.

Combat is a lot more hands-on then some other MMOGs out in the market at the moment, and requires constant interaction by the player, as they choose what move or skill they are going to do next. There are three attributes in fighting; Body, which is physical attacks, Mind, which is the use of power words and Spirit which is the use of sound, such as chants or instruments. When you target an opponent you can instantly see how their attributes compare to yours, and therefore use an attack which is more likely to do the most damage.

Your Chi also builds up the more attacks you successfully pull off in a row, and then goes back down when you get hit. It goes up exponentially the more variety you use in your attacks also. You can release your Chi whenever you want, but the bigger it gets the bigger the result. When maxed out, your Chi will unleash a massive attack against your opponent, putting them in a whole world of pain, while at the same time boosting your stats. It'll be interesting to see how Chi will affect combat.

NCSoft decided that they didn't want to have armour as clothing, as otherwise everyone just wears whatever gives the best protection, instead of what looks best. So all clothing is solely for costume, so you can wear whatever you like. This will allow a lot more opportunity for individuality.

One of the most interesting ideas for Tabula Rasa is the way you can save your character. When you start you only choose your name and your gender. At level five you specialise your character further, however you can save your character as a template. After specialising your character, if you decide that you would rather load your previously saved template into an existing or new character slot you can. This way you never make a major irreversible decision of your characters fate.

Tabula Rasa is shaping up to be an amazing game, with some of the most experienced makers of MMOGs this industry has seen developing it. It has a lot of innovative ideas, and I'm sure more then we've so far. This is definitely one to watch.