Darkfall Online is a new MMO coming out sometime this year.
The groundbreaking about this particular game, is how free you are. The game is anything but linear (unlike crappy AoC ).

You start out in an NPC area, where you get to skill up a bit, under relatively good protection. There are no levels in the game, but there will be maybe 1000 different skills that can be leveled up. A player gets to level a small amount of skills up to 100%, and a certain amount additional skills can be leveled to 75%. The game will focus on skills rather than level and gear as other MMO does. A warrior can't just choose a target, and then chop away at him, smashing his buttons. He has to be careful about WHEN he attacks, and on which bodypart he attacks. A ranger also cannot just target a player, and then autoshoot at him. Ranged attacks, such as the bow, works as in the real world. The archer will have to manually aim, and ahve to take the distance into account, when he chooses the angle and power added to the bow, as the arrow will be effected by the law of gravity.

Another thing that will make this MMO stand out in the crowd, is that only a few kingdoms on the main continent are occupied by NPC's. The rest of the kingdoms can be taken over by clans, who can build cities, fortifications, production sites, etc.

The game has no PvE content, the gameplay relies on PvP. If you die, your opponent gets to loot your equipment and anything you might have been wearing, that hasn't been destroyed.

Another thing about the game is sheer size of the land. According to developers it takes approximately 12 hours to travel on foot from one end of a continent to another. This can be shortened by the use of mounts or by building ships.

If the game seems interesting to you, feel free to apply to the clan I am currently in

The game's homepage: http://darkfallonline.com/
Location test vids (Pre-beta graphics test video): http://files.darkfallonline.com/darkfallvideo.zip
My clan's homepage: http://darkfallclan.pro-forums.com

_________________
<@Howard_s> usa just has a made up economy - they can't really go broke

JuncoPartner: I could barely hold it up for long.

A few screenshots from the pre-beta version of the game:

_________________
<@Howard_s> usa just has a made up economy - they can't really go broke

JuncoPartner: I could barely hold it up for long.

What you mean "crapy AoC" all the things described are in AoC asweel.

But ye this game seems pritty cool, too bad all MMO´s are way too timeconsuming

First of all... AoC is level based.

Second of all, AoC is like THE most linear game ever produced!

I tried getting past the starting area a couple of times in the beta, but it's just soooooooooo boring!

_________________
<@Howard_s> usa just has a made up economy - they can't really go broke

JuncoPartner: I could barely hold it up for long.

I agree with AoC comments.. this game looks interesting spike, when its due out?

_________________
Da boyz need themselves a Nob they do

We were expecting beta to start within a month, but according to Aventurine, they would be cthe beta phase, which for some odd reason makes sense to me The game has been eight years underway, and has changed alot i nthose years. Every little feature the developers have added, has been tested thoroughly to make sure it fits the game, and thus the bugs should have already been flushed out.

There will be a small beta a month before the game is released, with the purpose to stresstest the servers, and find out what the max population on each server will be. Atm. they are looking at 40k+ players per server.

Beta signups are already clsoed, but my clan is in Beta group II, whcih means that there's a 75% chance we will be asked to joi nthe beta.

According to the latest dev announcement, they have decided to distribute the game themselves this year.

My guess is they estimate september/october, and the final release day will be in november/december.

_________________
<@Howard_s> usa just has a made up economy - they can't really go broke

JuncoPartner: I could barely hold it up for long.

Well i liked AoC, PvP is gonna be so cool
This saterday stating the big ganking

_________________

We Shall Not Be Moved!

I sort of don't like the lack of penalty in AoC

I'm still waiting for a fantasy setting MMO where you don't level up and its just about skills and economy.

like EVE but then fantasy setting

_________________
Da boyz need themselves a Nob they do

That would be Darkfall

_________________
<@Howard_s> usa just has a made up economy - they can't really go broke

JuncoPartner: I could barely hold it up for long.

there is still a level up system in Darkfall though.. Just use something a lot and you "level" it up. Besides there seems to be a general lack of publicity on it.

_________________
Da boyz need themselves a Nob they do

Had a look at Darkfall - looks interesting and will certainly give it a go.

Will probably have a go at AoC in the meantime, and hopefully won't be subjected to too much of the following:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s-rl3RPC_Mw