Ok guys, I'm fairly sure there was another Mortal Online topic somewhere, but it's 5:20AM and I didn't see it anywhere after using the search function, so forgive me for a possible re-topic.

Anyway, I was curious who might be trying this game out when it releases? They'll be starting pre-orders on June 29th which gives the first 10,000 people to pre-order beta access.

The latest news post explains this is additional detail, found here:
http://www.mortalonline.com/news/june-05-06-09

Now, I'm sure many of you who haven't looked into MO yet are wondering, "Why should I try out MO when we already have Darkfall?! We've invested so much time leveling and working our way toward impacting the game!" Well, the truth is, that is in fact a personal choice. However, let me present everyone with a few fact that drew me to this game.

First off, MO is very similar to what a lot of us are already playing. I think this will actually benefit us in that we will already be in the full-loot, full-pvp mind-set. We'll be ready to risk a few pixels and do a bit more exploring early on, working harder to reach new areas. I think Darkfall prepared us a bit more for this type of game.

The other things that drew me to MO as my next possible MMO were more specific to what MO will offer us that Darkfall failed to.

Player housing:
The fact there will be player housing was a big one for me. Player cities are fun and all that on Darkfall, but really they're just a piece of land to fight over. The benefits are trivial, in my opinion.

However, in MO the player housing will serve for more of a purpose. Not only will they be land to fight over, but also a means of bringing the guild together. So, far they've been presented as fairly close to what Darkfall offers, only in the case of MO we can choose where we want to setup our town, who want to have access to the buildings, and we don't have to worry about random sieges as these will likely only come during war.

We don't have to worry about only a specific number of places available to build a city either. We can find a piece of land near a resource we'd like to have and build up our city/palyer housing. No more defending a pointless hamlet when we can build anywhere WE choose.

True player-skill pvp:
In MO, you're able to aim your attacks at legs, arms, or someone's head to really deal damage. You can block actively, etc. So, a player who can create his or her own technique and really get into sword-play will rule.

No Leveling:
There's no more worrying over skilling up weapon skills to use a specific rank of weapon, either. They're saying that you can use anything, similar to Darkfall. However, it sounds like it will be a bit more open and less limiting in battle this way as well. No worrying over skilling up so that you can use knockback. -This may be open to interpretation as I am having trouble finding details on the melee skills other than a few forum posts and news items.

Crafting:
This is one of the most exciting aspects of MO. They claim there are 142,662,744 combinations of weapons you can create alone. Given, this is likely only the graphic, but hell.. Can you imagine a game where noone looks the same because they're weapon different armor, or weapon combinations? Not to mention the possibility of guild-only weapon and armor combinations. We all wear white robes and carry white swords and bows, etc.. I just fail to see how that isn't fun!

Check out more on that here: (Just a forum post, but if you scroll down the page a bit, you'll see a picture of one of the power-points that hte devs put together with some info on crafting.

http://www.mortalonline.com/forums/10424-140-million-combinations.html

Navigation:

This may seem more like a bad thing to some, but I find it to be a lot of fun. In MO, you'll have to make either your own maps, or buy maps from other players skilled in that craft. Everyone stars knowing very little of the world. It's impossible to just press M and get an idea of where you are. You have to explore and learn the area. This could really help us to setup a secret, secluded city that only a select few have found. It would be a blast to see just how hidden we could make it.

But, just exploring and creating maps would be a blast. -Here is some information on that as well. There's a developer post about 3/4 of the way down the post explaining this in a bit more detail.

http://www.mortalonline.com/forums/6222-navigating-mortal-online.html

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Anyway, that's all I'll explain for now. Honestly, a lot of it is still speculation, as many pre-release MMOs are; but there is a lot of information and a fairly friendly community waiting on the forums. I am honestly surprised at the community so far. I'm sure things will change once it releases, but thus far I've really enjoyed reading and getting to know more about the upcoming Mortal Online.

Please let me know if you're planning on trying it out as I'd love to join some of you in-game on the 29th.