The game is set on the island of Sal Vitas, now run by a corporate government that has the power of eternal life and death over its citizens. The rest of the world is presumed ruined and the fallout of its destruction roams the nights in the form of mutants. Naturally, the excess of the Sal Vitas government has inspired a reactionary insurgency called Noir. The players enter the struggle at this point and are free to experience the story from either perspective (government or Noir).

Fan Question: What will the construction system be like? Also, will players be able to create a city in mountains or in underground locations?How much is player involved in crafting? Is it the collect items and automatic transform when you have enough skill, is it something with success %, is it something completely different?

Tasos Flambouras: Crafting is pretty involved...you have to collect, or trade to acquire the raw materials, then the crafting of complex items is broken down into crafting sessions and you have to craft the building blocks first. There's a crafting time of a few seconds to several minutes. You have a success probability based on your skill, and the quality of the finished item will also vary from crafter to crafter. There are different considerations in enchantment and advanced crafting as well, which we'll leave for another time.

Masthead has been careful not to reveal too many details too quickly and want to avoid promises they cannot keep, a lesson no doubt learned from the dozens of independent MMOs that have come out swinging with promises they really couldn't keep. Unfortunately though, that left a lot to the imagination. For example, they claimed a deeper story that is more significant to the players, but exactly how that would happen is not yet available.

They prefer the open skill system - where any one character can use any skill in the game rather than being limited by a class - because it allows players to experience the game and its story from different angles. For example, in WoW, a player really only has one incentive to do a quest: the reward. The experience itself is the same each time. In Earthrise, players could theoretically run through the story in different class roles, which increases replayability.