The first title from Curt Schilling’s 38 Studios gets a release date for European audiences announced at GamesComm.
The head content team for Kingdoms of Amalur: The Reckoning sounds like a 90s rock supergroup of fantasy game talent – plus one baseball player. The background story is written by R.A. Salvatore, the visual design is headed by Spawn-creator Todd MacFarlane and the game design is by the lead designer of Bethesda’s Morrowind and Oblivion, Ken Rolston. The team at 38 Studios was assembled by an unlikely videogame CEO, former Red Sox hero Curt Schilling. After a strong showing at E3, Schilling announced at the GamesCom conference in Germany that Europeans will be able to play the single-player RPG Kingdoms of Amalur: The Reckoning on February 10th, 2012 on either the Xbox 360, the PS3 or PC.
“Reckoning is just the beginning of the deep, expansive lore and massive world that is Amalur,” said Schilling. “Reckoning has developed into something amazing and beyond my wildest dreams – I cannot wait to share it with gamers across the world next February.”
Schilling was a big EverQuest fanatic even as he was leading the Diamondbacks to a championship in 2001 and helping the Red Sox win their first World Series in 2004. Since he retired after the 2007 baseball season, he has transformed himself into a videogame entrepreneur by garnering his sports fame and passion for gaming into venture capital for 38 Studios. (Incidentally, 38 Studios takes its name from the number Schilling wore on his jersey in Boston.)
As Schilling hinted at, Reckoning is the precursor to the major MMO that 38 Studios is busy making at its headquarters in Providence, RI. The project is codenamed Copernicus, and, in talking to Schilling and Salvatore over the last year, it promises mechanics that the MMO crowd is familiar with and places them firmly in the setting’s lore.
Hopefully, the strategy of releasing a single-player game before the MMO will do for 38 Studios what it did for Blizzard and World of Warcraft. For my part, I’m interested in playing the singleplayer RPG from this creative team to see if they can meet the potential of the supergroup that Schilling formed.
I’d also like to know when Kingdoms of Amalur: The Reckoning is coming out in other territories. Come on, Curt, don’t neglect your fans here in the States.
Update: According to an interview with Ken Rolston as MMORPG.com, the North American release date is February 7th.
