EA and Bioware today announced Shadow Realms, a 4 vs 1 online RPG in which 4 human players with magical powers fight against another player controlling what’s called a Shadowlord and his AI army, the Shadow Legion as they invade modern day Earth. Seems similar to Evolve by Turtle Rock Studios, which is also 4 vs 1 with AI monsters. Where Shadow Realms seems to differ, is it follows a story which will be released in episodic form, and takes the RPG route vs. Evolve, which is a shooter.
Bioware hopes to bring the magic of table top RPGs like Dungeon’s and Dragon’s to life here, where the Shadowlord acts as your dungeon master, with the episodic content keeping the story going for as long as you play it, or Bioware gives up, whichever comes first. It’ll be interesting to see how this game progresses, for now I’m midly intrigued and will be sure to keep an eye on it. Shadow Realms will be released for PC at some unknown time in the future, but you can go ahead and sign up for alpha already. You can read the press release here if you are into that sort of thing, otherwise just check the live action trailer below.