Global Agenda, A New Spy Action-MMOG Using Unreal Engine 3

We seem to have missed this game when it was announced last month, but thanks to Blue's we can now add yet another title to the list of upcoming MMO games based on the Unreal Engine 3 technology. Called Global Agenda, this is supposed to be some sort of "spy-fi" Action-MMORPG, set on a 22nd century Earth engulfed in espionage and tactical covert operations. "A departure from the traditional online settings of high fantasy, outer space, or military", as the devs from Hi-Rez Studios like to think of it. They're at their first videogame project, by the way, and they sure couldn't have picked an easier one!

In Global Agenda, an invisible war is fought not with armies, but with elite teams of highly trained and well-equipped special agents, where technology is a race, knowledge is power, and everyone has an agenda. Players will be able to create, (extensively) customize, and develop an agent character, whose secret identity will have to be protected through covert activity, while increasing its skills and influence.

Instead of the usual guilds / corporations, the game will give players the option to establish their own secret aegncies, to compete in a technology race for advanced weaponry, and advance their own agenda. As such, some missions will even be targeted at other player-created agencies (as opposed to just NPCs), but quite frankly we have no idea how exactly they plan to pull that off. All we have to go by is the following statement:

"We want to provide players an engaging, next-generation tactical combat experience, but within the context of a single, evolving, massively multiplayer online world where actions have consequences", says Todd Harris, COO of Hi-Rez Studios. "Player-created agencies, with the right strategy and skill, can have a very real impact on each other and the world itself."

Of course, there will also be solo and co-op missions, and considering that Hi-Rez originally announced their Unreal Engine 3 licensing agreement with Epic way back in 2005, Global Agenda should be in a pretty presentable state of development by now. So we demand they present some in-game media already!

(N.B. Archive text, links removed)