Announced yesterday at the annual GDC, German based MMO developer Bigpoint will be bringing a browser-based MMO version of Battlestar Galactica to consumers “this fall.” The license was granted by SyFy, which currently has a growing gamer/television tie-in project. This is SyFy’s second space-themed MMO tie-in, as last month they combined forces with Atari to promote the release of Star Trek Online.
Bill Kispert of NBC Universal comments, “Battlestar Galactica is a supremely gameable intellectual property, with compelling character classes, a fantastic array of ships and weaponry, multiple worlds, and a dramatic storyline.”
Bigpoint, which is set to open a San Francisco office this year, will develop the game, and is projecting a “fall” opening at Syfy.com for a limited 30 day run. The final version of the game is slated to run on the Unity game engine, which allows for 3D graphic rendering in web browsers. The unity engine is currently employed in Tiger Woods Online, and has the advantage of being cross platform (sorry Linux users – not for you).
Players will be able to choose between Human or Cylon races, and will feature a combination of space combat, missions and exploration. Now, granted, Bigpoint themselves title the game as an “adapted” version of the popular series – but hardcore fans might find a few holes in the overall concept. The series itself focuses on the remaining 45,000 humans after the initial Cylon attack. Will there only be 45k Human slots available? Would only Capricans be able to be pilots? Would Aerilons be the only in-game farmers? And what about that worker rebellion that stemmed from the Tylium refinery ship? The upside of the entire concept is, “All of this has happened before. All of this will happen again.” Built in replayability!
Bigpoint CEO Heiko Hubertz comments, “Cooperation between Bigpoint and NBC Universal is a very important strategic step for us. Battlestar Galactica has a huge and passionate fan base. We are proud to be able to publish such an internationally famous title as one of our online games. For the first time ever, we’re relying completely on Unity in order to offer our users fantastic game graphics right in their browsers.”
Tags: battlestar galactica, Bill Kispert, Heiko Hubertz, NBC, star trek, syfy
