No, I'm not talking about the recent subscription problems that Hellgate:London is having. I am talking about the atmosphere and the brooding mood set by the game. Finally got my collectors edition copy on Saturday and before I came down with a nasty cold was playing it right until raid time Saturday night.

Before I get into Hellgate, let me throw out there that our guild in WoW one shotted Terestian Illhoof and then cleared the free epic chess event before we decided to call it a night. It took us a while to kill Illhoof, but we got him down and he coughed up a plate healing piece and another cloth item. Unfortunately as the night went on I got more and more sick and was really not all that into raiding. I eventually logged out at around 9pm and crashed on the couch. Terestian Illhoof is an optional boss in the library section of Karazhan. Another great week in Kara for the guild and next week we will pick it up again and start from boss one to get some more purples flowing in.

Got up Sunday morning and cranked out some more Hellgate: London before I went back to sleep. Why I wake up at 5am on the weekends I have no idea. My collector's edition is kinda "collectory" but again it comes no where near rivaling the Burning Crusade edition. It has a nice fold out map in it, a bonus disc with a short film about Flagship Studios and some typical videos they took off their website. Along with this I got a dye pack for in game that turns my armor red (dye packs are worn like gear, you don't actually dye the item) and a cool manta/nether ray pet that I can summon and have follow me around. The edition came in a huge box with really cool artwork on it and a nice fold open inside container that held the bonus goodies and snap case.

As for Hellgate, I really like this game. It has some stability issues (HG:L has already crashed more than Vanguard did and that is saying something), but it is a cool "collect items and kill lots of stuff" diversion and the setting is fantastic. What I like the most are the little features that keep you coming back. The monster types are always random, you never know what you may fight when you zone in somewhere. This keeps you on your toes. I am only level 6 right now, playing a marksman. I also made a engineer and a blademaster. The engineer is interesting because you can summon some really cool bots that follow you around and help you fight or provide benefits. I am prone towards kick ass guns and long range fighting in my shooters so I will probably stick with Abroxus, my marksman. I am playing the online game, but there is also a single player game like Diablo 2, where your SP characters are separate from those you have online. The ability to mod weapons and find interesting things by taking apart loot you do not need makes the game very adaptable. I only have three character slots unless I subscribe. Of course subscriptions are optional, and have been fixed as of Sunday morning.

"We have reactivated the ability to get a subscription membership. We're currently accepting credit cards as payment methods and are working to bring both Pay Pal and Pay by Cash back online as soon as possible. This has taken us slightly longer than expected as we've needed to work with several other companies and banks to ensure the security and integrity of our subscription service"

Bill Roper posted a state of the game announcement at the forums, which you can read here. Here is a small clip from that message:

"It's been less than a week since we've opened the Hellgate, and we're ecstatic at how many people have already joined us online. Overall, the game is running really well. Our game servers are incredibly stable and the community has been great about working with us to identify and resolve issue through the forums. We've been working through some issues as every new online game does, and as is befitting the season, we've our share of both tricks and treats."

I really like Flagship Studios, and being a huge fan of Diablo 2 I followed these folks pretty closely when they broke off. They seem to be the masters of random dungeon generation, random loot and quick hack and slash game play. For sure their games, even the FREE Mythos, are way ahead of any of the garbage that Titan Quest tried to deliver. After watching the DVD and the behind the scenes look at the company you can see how much work Flagship put into getting Hellgate off the ground. I am willing to overlook some of the early bugs and niggles to see the great game that lies beneath any issues I have, and I would gladly subscribe to support the product at this point, much like Dungeon Runners. I won't be subscribing though until I figure out exactly WHAT they are putting in for subscribers, since it has been a never ending news feed of rumors and ideas concerning that subject. Already however I am wanting more character slots and some of the subscriber only loot I am seeing on vendors. Sometimes when we write about a company and yell at them and rip them apart we have to remember that there are people behind those message boards, reading those things. Unless of course it is an Electronic Arts home page board in which case that is run by pod people devoid of emotion. So Bill Roper and others are replying and talking about the issues, just remember that. Oh and Bill if you should ever read this: you gotta fix that chat system, it destroys any community you are trying to work on. How games can come out and not have good chat systems is beyond me. This should be the FIRST damn thing you work on!

I am also working on the Halloween pet in game. This Zombot is manufactured by gathering the parts you need off in game rare zombies that spawn on maps. I still have a lot of blood to collect and luckily the event was extended due to problems Flagship was having with servers last week.

Of course if you know Flagship Studios you know that no game is safe from a "leg of Wirts" type quest, and Hellgate is no exception. Humans no longer rule the planet, and the Court Road was the first place where the atmosphere of the game really kicks in.

L'IL JOEY PART ONE

The first time Abroxus, my marksman, entered Tottenham Court Road, he was greeted with a dark and dreary landscape that no longer belonged to mankind. It was snowing, and my mission was to fight my way in and grab the prosthetic leg of Joey off a particularly nasty demon that had ripped it off his body during a narrow escape attempt.

"And I swear to you mister, as I stand here living and breathin', the thing ate my leg he did. Ate it clean off me like it was a snack!"

I still remember the look on the boy's face when he told me that. Most kids exaggerated and I was able to look at him and smile. He was rough looking, like a kid that had seen too much already but he couldn't have been more than 15 years old. He was aged far beyond his years, and his eyes had witnessed terrors unleashed on the world that no child should have to witness.

Tussling his hair I told him I would do my best to get his leg back, as weird as it sounded I found myself wanting to help him. I was going that way anyway, so I might as well investigate his claims. Little did I know they were right and that my doubts would be aswayed soon enough.

Hours later....

I entered Tactical Stance, jumping up on a ruined automobile for a good vantage, equipped my rocket launcher, and unleashed all sorts of brutal punishment on the demon invaders from Hell. The demons poured out of the ruined buildings to my left and right, and then up ahead more zombie type cadavers ran toward me. I fired volley after volley into the mass of evil that was encroaching on me, my rockets coming out in threes and spiraling off into the pulpy fleshed assailants.

In groups of two and sometimes three the undead hell minions were vaporized, disintegrating into a bloody mist that lingered in the air for an unsettling amount of time. From behind me a new sound: a chilling, deep grunt... and I spun around just in time to catch a new demon type I had never seen pouncing on me through the air. All four skeletal limbs splayed apart as I traced a rocket round up and into his gut. My tactical position was no longer secure and I leapt off the old Renault sedan I was on and into the street, firing blindly ahead of me as snow fell harder. Over head the enemy ships of the Demons scanned the air, directing the minions of evil toward my heading. Barrels, fuel cans, boxes and parts of the old city around me shattered to pieces and debris flew everywhere. Now and then I was able to salvage some of the goods that spilled from the containers, but the amount of enemy soldiers bearing down on me left me little time to stop and gather what I needed. I rounded the corner of the street and there before me was a creature of unspeakable loathing.

He did not notice me at first, but as I watched I had the distinct impression that he sensed something was wrong. The sheer amount of carnage I had laid upon his pathetic minions had to have alerted him to the fact that something was terribly wrong with his day. This creature was a Grotesque of some stature, of that I was certain. Named Tantorus, he was obviously a lieutenant with a good amount of power. I crouched down and prepared to unleash my first volley on him. Unlatching the safety, I rested the launcher upon my shoulder and zoomed on the one headed, hunched back freak. He was there in my sites now, and watching him raised bile in my throat, I had to fight back waves of nausea as he spawned some maggots from festering wounds in his back.

"For the living you son of a ****...."

I pulled slowly on the trigger, and the kick threw me back as a trio of rockets whistled through the air and screamed at Tantorus. Two missiles struck home, ripping out chunks of his flesh which coated the nearby surroundings. One missile careened harmlessly into a building, and I cursed my old and outdated targeting sensors.

Tantorus was aware of me now, and he spun about and released a hideous moan that made the hairs on my neck stand on end. I stood up and fired from the hip, spreading another volley across his chest and arms. One of the missiles sunk into his pustering arm and never exploded. I knew that he had some sort of ability to resist the physical punishment of the rockets. I had to adapt. Slinging the launcher I reached under my flak vest and took out two rocket pistols, one modified to inflict fire damage courtesy of Bodger at Covet Garden Station. I had paid heavily for the modification, but that was a small price to pay for the use it would be now. Jamming a clip into each pistol, I backed up to avoid the demon bosses first charge and fired round after round at him. The fire shells careened out and exploded on their target, one after another and Tantorus was rocked backward. Stopping for a moment he shook his head to clear it of the confusion, his neck muscles bulging and twisting as he scanned his lower torso and noticed the immense holes I had opened in his abdomen and waist. He was dying slowly, and he knew it now.

I never stopped firing, I emptied clip upon clip into him and he started to lurch slowly as he tried to catch me, limping now Tantorus released screams of pain and howls of terror. With my back to a few buildings at the end of a dead end street I watched as he drew closer, a glimmer of hope in his eyes... those cold, dark circle gateways to thoughts that I did not want to know. I had one last option, and I took it quickly. Holstering my pistols I pulled out a grenade and primed it. Waiting for the perfect moment, Tantorus rounded the corner and saw he had me pinned. I threw the grenade and bounced it off the nearby ruined wall, allowing it to go around the corner and land at the feet of the massive mound of flesh that was my adversary. Quickly I dove under a wrecked truck and covered my head. Tantorus screamed as the grenade went off, the corner of the building providing me cover from much of the blast. A stinging sensation ripped through my ankle and I knew I had taken some shrapnel, but as bits of flesh and body parts rained down about me, I knew that the great demon was gone, vanquished at last.

Once the smoke had cleared, I pulled myself from under the truck. The alleyway was eerily quiet now, and before me lay the mass of bone and gristle and pulp that had once been Tantorus. Amidst the goo, laying there like some Excalibur sword in a rock, was a small prosthetic leg covered in bile and stomach acid. So it was after all, the young kid hadn't lied when he swore the creature had eaten his leg.

"Ha, well look at that..." I muttered. Scooping up the limb and shaking it to clear it of its grime I tucked it away in my backpack. It was a long run back to the access tunnel, and I needed to gather my surroundings. The sky was red, red like blood. There was nothing left of the world as we had once known it. Now there was only the underground and the few people that I knew that had adjusted, survived and were trying to rebuild.

"I'll be damned." I said to myself as the snow started again, covering the road in a thin sheen of wetness.

It suddenly dawned on me that we already were.