Electronic Arts announced at E3 2009 that they have picked up the publishing rights in North America and Europe for Realtime Worlds’ highly anticipated open-world online game APB or All Points Bulletin. Realtime Worlds will now join Valve, Harmonix, and Crytek in the prestigious EA Partners program.
The game will be released in early 2010 for PC, Xbox 360 and PS3 (according to GameTrailers, some publications have it just listed as PC and 360) and is being developed by many industry luminaries including David Jones (creator of Lemmings, Crackdown and Grand Theft Auto 1 and Grand Theft Auto 2).
Realtime Worlds’ latest project takes the universal theme of Criminals and Enforcement and brings it to a persistent, open world multiplayer setting in a modern, crime-ridden city.
APB is a “new breed of online game”. Set in a persistent living, breathing open-world urban environment where fame and fortune awaits all players. Some players will achieve this by feeding on the city, its people and its businesses . . . the Criminals. Some will live by a higher code and instead feed on the criminals and their organisations . . . the Enforcers. This dynamic where players become the core content for other players is one of the many unique features of APB. Its deep, rich customisation system provides players with the ability to completely personalise their identity. Looks, clothing, vehicles and even music, all to astonishing detail and quality.
Here is the E3 2009 trailer for the game.
The game will provide an online city that is “full of life, vehicles, and thousands of civilians”. In the game world up to 100 human players can inhabit at once as their own custom-designed character. The character creation process includes complete control to customize your clothing, tattoos, hair, face, body and much more.
Like a lot of games nowadays, moral choices will come into play and will effectively polarize the game into two sides: the criminals and the law, or enforcers. With short-term success and instant gratification coming to the criminals while longtime success and greater incentives will be rewarded to those who take the more difficult Enforcers path.
Here is the game’s reveal at E3 2009.