Preview the world of Copernicus with 38 Studio's Kingdoms of Amalur: Reckoning trailer

I'll need to see more before passing judgment ... wait. Actually, I'll definitely need to play it! Yes. So as to be fair, and all. Y'know. ;)

So if this releases in 2012, then I guess 38 Studios' MMO is probably 2013 or 2014?

Not as exciting as I thought especially for a 2012 release date. Still will keep an eye nonetheless.

Not much in originality eh?

And Curt himself said that the MMO is going to basically be a uber Raiders game. A lot of lost potential.

I'm excited to get my hand on the game. Can't wait!

The 2012 release date is because of EA. The game has been on schedule to release in September of this year, and was ready to do so. Yet, EA pushed it back due to competitive reasons, which tells me they probably didn't want to launch the game right around the same time as Elder Scrolls V. Also, the reason the graphics might not be the best is because Big Huge Games already had an engine built for an RPG when 38 Studios acquired them and they decided to use that for Amalur. I like the way the combat is looking though, and from what I saw on the demo the art looked great. With Ken working on this and R.A.'s drive for story I really expect the MMO itself to be less themeparkish and more on the sandbox side of things.

This is only the single player RPG and its looks ok from what they are showing. Lets see if the provide a trailer for the MMO version later on this year.

Looks like a million QTEs. That's about a million more than there should be.

I like the art,the moves of the Battlemage with his Chakras are awesome but it feels like a console game.So I'll wait for more infos on the game to give a final judgement.

Was that a guy in heavy armor casting spells?

I'm in.

How utterly conventional and uninspiring - maybe I was wrong to expect something a little unique and revolutionary from such big names, but it was just a bit... meh. I guess it's too early to say really, but I didn't get even a tingle of excitement from that trailer, so it has failed utterly to impress me.

Why can't we get more fantasy gaming worlds with even a spark of originality? Or at least some atmospheric depth without being so overblown? Why does every fantasy game have to seemingly use Dungeons & Dragons as its bedrock inspiration? That trailer just looked like so many fantasy RPG/MMORPG trailers we've seen before.

We've had so much medieval fantasy (albeit with tiny amounts of Steampunk mixed in sometimes) - isn't it about time we started getting more triple-A fantasy games set in original IPs that are inspired by other historic eras?

Such as:
- Old West (like the PnP RPG "Deadlands")
- Ancient Rome/Greece ("RuneQuest's" Glorantha was closer in tech to this era than the medieval era)
- Napoleonic Wars era (like the wargame Flintloque's setting)
- Steampunk Victoriana (like the PnP RPG "Castle Falkenstein", or maybe "For Faerie, Queen & Country", or even an American setting in that era like "Call of Cthulhu" has but with more overt magic/fantasy rather than horror - you could run that back into the Old West setting too)

Or imagine something based in a prohibition era gangster setting but with added magic and fantasy races/creatures - or just bring it up to the modern era and give us something like "Shadowrun", "Rifts" or "In Nomine" as an MMO.

Why is no Dev studio making fantasy RPGs brave enough to step beyond a medieval era and break away from D&D/Tolkien races in a big way - or if they stick to that, just to give us more flair, originality and atmosphere with it like "Morrowind" had, like the PnP RPG "Earthdawn" has, like the "Malazan" world from Steven Erikson's and Ian C Esslemont's novels, or the world of Glen Cook's "Black Company" novels, or "Kelewan" from the "Empire" novels written by Raymond E Feist and Janny Wurts, etc. You can do "the same, but different" without just cloning what has gone before and switching around the nametags.

I hope the world of Amalur/Copernicus has a lot more originality to it than that rather bland trailer showed.

Well, it's pretty. I'll give it that. But pretty is not enough for me.

Aion is pretty. AoC is pretty. Rift is pretty. None of those fantasy MMOs have much appeal or staying power, imo. GW2 is also pretty, but at least ArenaNet seems to be bringing something new to the MMO table.

So far, all I've really heard about Reckoning is how "great" it's going to be. : /

Just to alter a few perceptions but I did read an Interview with Curt somewhere which said that the MMO graphics would be somewhat different to the game shown here & that the control method wouldn't be the same either.

The only thing which will really cross over is the back-story & some of the events portrayed as this is set some 1000 years before the MMO starts it's time-line (RA Salvatore wrote up a 10,000 year back-story for the MMO that Reckoning draws upon)

For me the most intriguing thing will be Ken Rolston's involvement, if it can evoke some of the atmospherics & feeling that Morrowind did then for me that'll be enough reason to buy this game.

Ok, the video is about combat.
But combat is the least interesting part of MMOs these days.
What about all the rest?
If there is a rest.

I mean, is it a theme park? Linear questing?
Or is it a sandbox?

If this is a RIFT or TERA (or WOW for that matter) clone I'll insta-pass, because I'm so totally filled with these that I even don't want to read about them. Total waste of time to even delve into the lore, because lore is nice for movies and books, but an MMO needs to be far more dynamic than a static backdrop.

I know many will not agree with me. I you like theme park games, you have a lot of choice now, there are many.

For all the others... let's hope that combat is just a totally insignificant part of this game or it will be a sad day it is released. After soooo looong time of waiting (and so much money thrown at it) I expect more, far more, than anything out there right now (read RIFT).