The designers' office was dark except for some light coming in through a large window. Sprawling across one wall, opposite the window, was a huge map. Presumably this was my first look of the game world. On the back wall, opposite the door, was a scaled-up print of a portion of the main map. I surmised this was their chief area of focus. That fact was later confirmed, along with the information that this portion alone was larger than the surface area of the existing EQ. Looking back at the size of that portion compared to the full map made my brain weak. The game world Sigil is working on, is positively enormous.

So, I pulled up a chair at Steve Burke's desk, and we started filing through images from the game. I'll give Sigil this much: the lighting, texturing, and detail in the screenshots was incredible. That, of course, lead me to question whether they were true graphics and lighting or just staged shots designed to impress. I was assured that they were true, in-game references. **shrugs and grins** I had to ask, right? Screenshots of that quality from OTHER games are usually staged.

The screenshots are where I got my first, and last, glimpse at the potential tangible personal protection in the game, hereinafter referred to as "armor". Steve told me that the "armor" I saw was incomplete, and would look better before the game is released. Having not gotten to see any more "armor" after that point, I can't attest to the validity of his statement. But, if it was accurate, it was beautiful, and was going to look even better. But, then again, I expected no less when someone of Keith's caliber is guiding the visual direction of the game. Before I left Steve's desk, I related the fact that I felt the graphics were good for today's standards, but asked if they had plans in place that would make improving the graphics feasible upon the games release since it was entirely likely that games would improve, by leaps and bounds, by that point. John Capozzi assured me that the Sigil team is very talented and that they have a "forward thinking" approach to development. That answered my question; but, it didn't sate my curiosity. **grins**

Next, we made our way into the darkened cavern that is the graphics room. First, I got to watch over Den Beauvais's shoulder as Milo was running him through certain aspects of some of the game's character animations, skinning, etc. Den was fresh to the project when I got there; so, he was still getting acquainted with Sigil's setup. I flipped through his portfolio, admiring the work, while I asked Milo, and few others, about PC's, NPC's, the works. The sad part of the story here, though, is that I can't share the answers with you because of the NDA. **sighs** I CAN tell you that the models looked great, and the animations were near flawless. And, I only say NEAR flawless, because the motion capture from a regular sized person just does not look correct when it's applied to models with vastly different body types. I'm sure that will be worked out soon enough though.

From Den's desk I was guided over to a seat behind Martin Karlsson. Martin ran me through a city and its surrounding landscape while I posed questions to he and Lee Harker. The lighting and graphics in the city were beyond anything I've seen in any game thus far. It exceeded my expectations, even though I'd just seen screenshots from this very city not 45 minutes previous. Lights played through windows and bump mapping made everything push the line of reality. But, it wasn't bump mapping like I've seen from other games. It was more believable and less plastic. There were areas where I felt it was a bit too deep. But, hey that's just me. I'll take "a bit too deep" over too plastic-y any day.

Grass and Water had not been fully addressed yet, so they looked like poop. But, that is something else I fully expect to be rectified long before release. If those assets live up to the superb quality of the rock cliffs and the city walls, then they'll be praise worthy. I was hoping to see a more complete game, but I understand that the game is still fairly early on in it's development. That stuff will come with time. As I was being herded off for my next look at the game, Martin gave me a quick look at the wireframe that made up the city. The wireframe, of course, appealed to me almost as much as the visible graphics themselves. I'm a sucker for that kind of thing. **grins**

My next stop was Thad Clevinger's desk to have a look at some of the monsters. The first thing I was shown was an animation. An animation that was truly phenomenal. An animation that made me want to giggle and clap. An animation that I can't tell you anything about because of the NDA. **sighs** What I can tell you is that there was an extraordinary attention to detail, from how weight shifts during movement to how the body responds when it contacts the surface it is moving across. I can only hope that this animation is one of the first glimpses of the game that everyone gets to see.

From "the animation" we zoomed through a screen filled with the various monsters that had been produced. Again, bump mapping made them look incredibly realistic. They were very nice models. Realism aside, though, many of them reminded me of "monsters" I've seen elsewhere: movies, other games, television, etc. That's not saying they were ripped off; they were just "similar". It happens… right? At any rate, the monster models were great too. All that was left was to see actual game play. And, that's where I was headed next.

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