[Landain]

One of the main differences comes with the territory that each version calls its own. Huxley's world is made up of three cities, with "HLO City" being the exclusive location for 360 players. Those familiar with the PC version know that the massive 200-some player group battles happen outside the cities in battlezones anyway, so this structure looks to keep a good part of the fraternizing, item bartering, and relaxing specific to players on the same platform.

HLO city is exclusive to 360 players. So obviously HLO city will not be in the PC version. The PC PvP Battle Area will have in excess of 200 players in it according to this interview. That suggests that the 120 person limit we read about earlier means it may be 120 v 120 not the 60 v 60 that some have speculated. And as we have seen in previous interviews, the neutral cities--Nostalonia and Eska will be free from harrassment and 360 and PC players won't be able to interact there.

Much of what we saw of the game was how players in the 360's single-player campaign can meet up with online players. Webzen set up the game on both 360 and PC in our offices, and proceeded to play through a level in the 360 version, and simply by going through a specific door was able to meet up with a friend on the PC version playing across the room. How players will be able to coordinate and meet up in the final game has yet to be determined, but the potential for adding different kinds of features that players can take back into their single-player games seems immense.

Ok, I stand corrected. According to this PC and X360 players will be able to interact. I still want to see it for myself. :shock:

However, unlike in many MMOs, the developers want to make sure that players at a higher level don't have a dominating advantage and that skill still plays a key role. Thus, a good player who is just starting out should theoretically be able to take out a long-time player with slower reflexes, though obviously it will be a challenge.

Skill is still more important than level. 8)

Graphically, given the current early nature of the 360 game, the PC version clearly looks nicer in a side-by-side comparison, but the developers claim that by the 360 version's release they expect the two to look roughly equivalent. Running on Unreal Engine 3, the PC version right now looks as good as if not better than any other game on the market, so a very high standard has been set for the developers to match on 360. When asked if he foresees any problems making the 360 version up to the PC standard, producer Kijong Kang says, "Not really. Epic has already shown that it can be done with Gears of War. We also have the technology to make the transition from PC to Xbox 360 a smooth one."

The last sentence bodes that question about PC and X360 player interaction. I have to wait and see what E3 shows.

With the PC version scheduled for release at the end of this year and the 360 version on the way roughly six months after that, there's plenty of time for the game design to come together as well as the technology already appears to have. "We are launching the games separately because they will each feature unique content," says Kang. "Having separate release dates allows us to give each game the attention that it deserves, thus making them both high-quality and really fun."

Obviously both platforms have different content and with that difference, there will be areas that PC can't go and areas X360 players can't go. According to this it will come out at the end of the year. Some of us have been predicting a fall release--November is not unreasonable however it could mean as early as October. X360 players will have to wait half a year longer to see Huxley though.