More News On "Cross-play" Game The Crossing

The latest issue of Games for Windows magazine has the promised cover story on The Crossing, the upcoming Source engine based first person shooter from developer Arkane Studios. The game design will attempt to merge aspects of single player and multiplayer in what the article is calling "cross-play", all based around a storyline that centers on the city of Paris that has fallen into disarray following the collapse of the French government. There's also jumping between parallel universes to a world where in the Middle Ages the Knights Templar did not disban and have in fact taken control of the government.

The merging of single and multiplayer in The Crossing happens when "story players" (either by themselves or in co-op mode) suddenly switch over to fight live "skirmish players". Skirmish players can also go into story missions, taking over enemies that normally would be controlled by a game's AI. Arkane Studios is apparently planning to control the game's servers for players of The Crossing to assure that the mixing of single and multiplayer matches is seemless. There are hints about unlockable content in The Crossing for players that participate in these kinds of matches. The Crossing is still early in development; the article states it's not due until sometime in 2008 and the screenshots that accompany the article are said to be very early (they pretty much look like a Half-Life 2 mod).