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| Liz Maas |
What does the team behind Pocket Legends have in store for us next?
06.13.11 - 1:52 PM
At E3 we were able to meet up with Spacetime Studios, the developer behind Pocket Legends. The company's story begins in 2005, when the people behind Spacetime were working for NCSoft (Lineage, City of Heroes) on PC projects, Star Legends: The Blackstar Chronicles included. Unfortunately, Blackstar wouldn't see the light of day due to NCSoft's purported lack of interest in a sci-fi setting. After Spacetime Studios spun off as an independent company, they last year released Pocket Legends for iOS and Android platforms. The title now boasts nearly 4.5 million combined downloads to date, with the company constantly updating the title every couple of days on average. Among many other features, Pocket Legends boasts the ability for players on both platforms to play together in the same servers.
Following on the heels of Pocket Legends's success, Spacetime Studios is preparing to release Star Legends: The Blackstar Chronicles as an iOS, Android, and eventually PC title, with similar features but a different theme. The Blackstar Chronicles will soon be in beta phase on Android and has already garnered quite a bit of interest, with players already trying to reserve their desired screen names.
Taking place some four thousand years in the future, The Blackstar Chronicles is said to be very story-driven. In this time, humans are rather science-focused, and have discovered "fast gates," - these are really just abandoned wormholes which take you to different areas in space. As with many other titles with this type of theme, it's inevitable that you will find yourself going up against a hostile alien species. The Scorn race, unlike humans, are actually magic-based, and described by the developer as "intergalactic a-holes." You'll stumble upon other interesting races, not the least of which are the bug-like Vular.
Star Legends: The Blackstar Chronicles will start off with four different campaigns and twenty levels so there will be plenty to do in the game. The game will also include a PvP (players vs. player) mode and an auction house for items. If you're more of a co-operative player, you can have up to five people total in your party. So far three different classes will be available to choose from: tanks, DPS, and mages, and you can choose male or female for any of these. While we did not get an in-depth look at any of the three, one interesting tidbit is that some areas in the game are only available to certain classes - something to take note of when you form your parties, but also something that might add to the game's replay value.
You will be able to keep an in-game friends list; unfortunately, Game Center (on iOS) support isn't planned at this time. Just like an MMO, you will have your choice of emoticons and animations, and if you already play Pocket Legends, you will be able to use its currency in The Blackstar Chronicles and vice versa, since you can use the same account. And just like Pocket Legends, iOS and Android players will be playing together.
The developer promises frequent updates just like with Pocket Legends, where approximately once a month the game will receive new campaigns, level cap raises, and other sorts of in-game updates. The iOS and Android versions will be launching sometime in July, with a PC version - which will make The Blackstar Chronicles the first PC MMO to share servers with iOS and Android players - being prepared for the third quarter of this year.
