PAX Prime 2010: FireFall Preview

Here is a game that came out of no where for myself and fellow P*N staff member, Jose Adrovet. FireFall is being developed by Red 5 Studios, which will be their first game since they were founded in 2005. The game will feature an online team based shooter with several different classes that you can choose while playing in a persistent world that will consist of hundreds of players, think Borderlands but massive. While you are thinking of Borderlands, FireFall shares several other similarities to the game, the visual aspect of the game is very similar with almost way the game is cell shaded, the FireFall characters look very Borderlands like, as do some of the enemies. The world and the environment were very different from what might expect with the Borderlands comparisons, I saw lush environments that would change as you move across different regions of the games. The world was huge, while we couldn’t get an estimated size from the team at Red 5 Studios, as we were flying into one of the towns we saw just so many areas that would wanted to explore.

For online play FireFall will feature on online army (your clan) that you will be apart of with your friends, there will also be a friends list type of system in place too so you will have easy access to find your buddies online. As far as your online army, your character will only be able to be apart of one army at a time but you will be allowed to have multiple characters to your profile. As far as the classes go there will be special battlefield abilities that will be granted to your character based off of the class you choose.

As far as the story goes, FireFall will take play on Earth in 2233, what’s going on is humans have discovered crystite which is suppose to be the perfect form of energy and because of this, a power struggle breaks out and the Crystite Wars start between a group known as the Chosen and the rest of humanity that is fighting for it’s right to survive. That’s where the game will kick off and you will experience the rest of the story from there.

Here is the kicker to FireFall, it will be free, no online monthly subscription prices, no initial purchase, FireFall will be supported through micro-transactions. No word yet about the level of micro-transactions as that is apparently one of the things still being ironed out. There also isn’t word about PC requirements yet as that is still being worked out but we were told that Red 5 Studios will be trying to make the game as accessible as possible.

Steve’s final thoughts: FireFall came out of no where for me and became a game that I really want and want now. Huge online play with a co-op style similar to Borderlands, a huge and beautiful world, and add the fact that I don’t have to pay a dime to even play it, sign me up, I’m sold! FireFall is scheduled for a Fall of 2011 release but will have a online beta that Platform Nation will do doing some special stuff with down the road so stay tuned to P*N for more info.