Complete with a soundtrack performed by the London Symphony Orchestra and what may be the ultimate achiever hook - the chance for one player to exert his or her sovereign will over all players in the game - Codemasters' current localization project, archlord gold, is possibly the freshest concept to come to the west from Asia since Final Fantasy XI. We learn more about the game that's already a smash hit in Korea from Codemasters' Tim Hodges, Community Liaison Officer for archlord gold.

Jeff "Ethec" Woleslagle, Ten Ton Hammer - Judging by the teaser movies, archlord gold seems to have refreshingly dark overtones for a fantasy MMO, or did we get the wrong impression?

Tim Hodges - archlord gold Community Liaison Officer - No, you are not wrong, really.archlord gold is, like most MMOs, what people make of it. The Lore involved with ArchLord does set quite dark initial tones, as is reflected in the CGI movies that you have all seen I’m sure. The ArchLord premise, being able to rule over the in game world with a series of powers, can lead to some very nice extremes. You could well get the really dark guild that strives for world domination and when in power choose to be very aggressive with their powers. On the flip side though you could well get a guild that wants to stay in power for a long time and so chooses to be very good with their powers. Using them to help out other players as they wander the world.

Ten Ton Hammer - The game's title reflects the ability of one player to ascend to an all-powerful position in the game world. Could you outline how a player become the archlord gold? Does his or her race or guild gain substantial PvP bonuses?

Hodges - So at the moment players go about becoming archlord gold by completing a number of stages. Stage one involves siege warfare; players and their guild will have to apply to siege one of the three castles that are in the game. Players will need to attack these castles often alongside other guilds. Once they have captured the castle and claimed sole dominance over it they must challenge the castle keeper for control of that castles Archon. Once they have completed this stage they will be summoned to the archlord gold castle, here the three guilds will face each other in order to capture each other Archons.