Great Preview on Gamespy - Dan - 10:26:08 PM EST

Go here right now and read! This is the article I've been waiting for. I want to quote the whole thing... we'll settle for these.

Producer Romain De Waubert De Genlis calls it "working on the immersion of the player," which doesn't sound too exciting on paper until you see it in action. His team at Arkane Studios (creator of the ambitious Arx Fatalis) is creating Dark Messiah of Might & Magic, a spectacular fantasy epic that should wow people with its interactive environments and open-ended gameplay. It's nominally a role-playing game: you create a character and advance your different skills based on how you want to play the game. But it plays like a fantasy first-person shooter, one where anything goes.

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First, as a warrior, we ran headlong into the fray. We shield-bashed an orc, then kicked him off of the cliff where he plummeted to the rocks below. Next, on the platform, we fought sword-to-sword against another orc, sparks flying. Using a special combat move we ripped away his shield. Then we grabbed his neck, plunged a sword into his gut, and kicked the body off of our sword and over the edge of the platform. By now, more orcs had rushed toward us to investigate the noise. We ran inside the room, which was filled with barrels and a side of beef hanging from the ceiling. As we fought tooth and nail with these guys, barrels fell over and smashed or rolled around the room. At one point we kicked the side of beef and sent it hurtling toward our opponents. It was as vicious of a fight as you could get: the camera even goes to slow motion for spectacular killing blows.

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