To be able to compete with today's high standard on graphics features and also to lower the risk and the development time in the project, I started cooperating with Epic Games. They showed an interest in our team and the project and supplied us with the rewarded game engine Unreal Engine 3 and the network engine for our game Mortal Gold.

MMOsite: When and why did you decide to work on Mortal Online? Where does the development currently stand? So far, what are the major challenges you've encountered?

Henrik Nystrom: Creating a "sandbox" mmorpg where it's up to the players to shape the world has always been a dream to me. When I got the opportunity after many years of hard work and finding all parts needed to create such game, with a talented team, great partners and the funds to develop it, it was an easy choice to go for it.

There are many challenges in creating an open mmorpg, as you never know what the players will be up to in the free world. From optimizing performance to creating enough of variation in customization for the players is an important but challenging part in a mmorpg. What we focus on is the features we think will stand out and will interest a lot of players and then continue to develop the game even after release.

The production of  Mortal Gold is currently in a stage where we are migrating the game content into our new network solution.

MMOsite: In overview, what kind of MMORPG is Mortal Online? What are the major features that will set  Mortal Gold apart from other MMORPGs other there?

Henrik Nystrom: Mortal Online is very different from today's mmorpgs. You are free to choose your own play style and what you want to do in the game. There are no levels or linear quests that you have to follow to continue to advance your character. In Mortal Gold it's a combination of the character skills and your own player skills, and training them, that will lead you to success. You are not forced to grind quests or fight monsters to advance, you can choose to play a blacksmith without entering a single battle. You can focus on economy without fighting, build houses, trade routes and much more. It's really up to the players to do what they want instead of us focusing on balancing and creating a linear level-based world. Of course with this freedom there is a risk, the game doesn't stop other players to start rob and murder other players to take their items. But there are some zones with guards that do protect innocent players from getting murdered or plundered.

I would say that this kind of free world will give the players a unique and challenging experience.