Back? Good. I’m not sure what to think. There are some things that are interesting, and others that scare the hell out of me. Let’s take a look at what we know:

1) They bought tradewars.com
Last time I checked on it, tradewars.com was on sale for about $1,000+. This implies that the company probably has some type of financial backing. Maybe.

2) they’re making a modernized version of the classic BBS game
Be afriad.

3) Who are these people?
I don’t know. They’re a startu. They have no track record, so we don’t know what they’re good at. The webpage also doesn’t list Bio’s for the people that work there unlike other companys. For all we know, these people could have been the masterminds behind Trolls on Treasure Island for the NES.

4) It’s an Massively Multiplayer Online Game (MMOG)
It takes a LOT of money to make an MMOG. Just ask the guys at Ultima Online. Took the entire team at Origin 3 years to make it, and it shipped broken. So whoever funds/publishes this game needs to have deep pockets. But most of the major publishers already have MMOGs. Electronic Arts has Ultima Online, Sony has Everquest, Square has Final Fantasy 11, Sega has Phantasy Star Online. Out of the rest of the top of the bunch, this leaves Nintendo, (not likely) Acclaim, and THQ. If THQ or Acclaim fund this project, I’m going to declair that Jesus did die in vain. Calling those two “game” companies good is like saying Battlefield Earth is a technical masterpiece.

But still, there are plenty of publishers who could fund it. Sierra looks like a good choice.

5) The MMOG market is competative
Besides having to compete with the current MMOGs, there are many more coming down the pipe. It’ll have to compete with UO2, Planetfall, FreeLancer and who knows what else. Perhaps their biggest rivalry will be with Jumpgate and FreeLancer. I’ve played the beta for Jumpgate and it’s pretty much graphical tradewars. Unfortunatelly, it leaves a lot to be desired. As for FreeLancer, who knows when it’ll actually be out.