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Shack Interview: Project Hippasus
by Chris Remo, Mar 14, 2007 2:25am PDTUpstart Canada-based studio Frozen North, with the financial assistance of Infusion Development, is currently crafting a PC and Xbox 360 MMO with the working title Project Hippasus, themed around ancient Greece. The setting is relatively uncommon for the genre, but the game's mechanics are what really set it apart: it features an open-ended spell crafting system based around actual mathematical principles. Frozen North CEO Julian Spillane is quick to note that the MMO is intended first and foremost as entertainment--but that "at the end of the day you might accidentally learn something." Nick sat down with Spillane and Infusion's Gregory Brill to find out what exactly Project Hippasus is, and what it isn't.
Julian Spillane: There are a few different levels. First of all, there's your traditional MMO questing system. We don't want like, "Kill ye 20 rats and bring them back to me." We want a kind of system where there are more mathematic quests and puzzles. I don't know if you ever played Knights of the Old Republic, but in that game they actually had a version of the Towers of Hanoi--a famous, hundreds-of-years old mathematical problem--which they disguised completely. So we want to work with things like that, and take classic [mathematics], like magic squares, and turn them into something mythical and arcane. Of course there will be your standard quests, go defeat so-and-so. But so-and-so will be a powerful mage who's well-versed in quantum theory, or chaos theory, or probabilities. And it's different then, because it becomes more of a thinking man's battle. It becomes a lot more about thought processing as opposed to grinding. I hate grinding. It's a problem that we're really facing in the MMO field. Everything is grinding. We want to get rid of that completely.
Comments
lolz
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My biggest question really, is how much funding they have. From the interview I got the idea these guys have no professional experience - and I am shocked someone invested in them. I would love to know the story behind that.
Then you have the horrible theme, the awful idea of mathematic gameplay, market misinformation, bad name and bad character design.
The environments, although not stellar are passable at an alpha stage.
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I've pretty much lost count of the amount that have been downsized or cancelled.
Only a few of the best ones are turning a hansome profit.
If you want to make money without spending a lot, look at Korea's current gaming scene. Free, unbloated online games supported by subscriptions for bonus features and cash shops.
The korean PC industry is BOOMING. Games like Golf and simple racing games are known by everyone. Even the new games with the smallest communites like Kwon Ho have tens of thousands of players. Korea has a lot of MMO's too, but aren't enjoying the explosive growth of the game's I'm referring to.
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I actually struggled through Grade 9 so thank you but no way am I going back there ;)
I fear I lack the intelligence of a ninth grader.
They should really subtitle this game, "Are you smarter than a nineth grader?"
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http://www.shacknews.com/screens.x/hippasus/Project+Hippasus/1/thumbs/070314_hippasus_02.jpg
Architecture is based on math - maybe this is ninth grade architecture? ;)
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Like somebody else said, this will never see the light of day. Let this be a lesson to you guys--before you go pimping your "game" make sure that you have something to show. A completely text-based proof of concept would have been more impressive than some generic 3D renders and a bunch of hot air talk.
Oh well, here's hoping they can actually get it working. I'm not crossing my fingers, though.
I actually enjoyed it a lot but in the grand scheme of things it was pointless since you could gather the information outside of the game. Tooling around burning regeants and time was a waste when you could head to a website, pop in the regeants and get the spell that it would create if one existed for the combination.
In this game I'm guessing one would create some mathematical formula and tie it to a spell or item. Throwing out mathematics on the fly, within seconds, would be over most peoples heads.
A mathematical system would easily allow a much more robust system, but what happens when that system is fully understood.....when the entire premise of the game is cracked to say the least. Knowledge is no longer required, only the ability to go to your favorite MMO site and mindlessy copy the information is.
I'd recommend that Frozen North keeps the system as secret overall and random per account, per character, as possible. Each character a snowflake so no two formula's ever do the same thing for any player.
if i had to study to cast spells i'd rather just play something else.
"your equasion fails. your fireball backfires and hits you for 3000. Somerandomenemy's fireball also hits you for 3000. You die."
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