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For those of you who loved WarCraft, WarHammer : Dark Omen and WarHammer : Shadow of the Horned Rat, a new kid on the block is about to shake things up. WarCraft 2 implemented heroes in which you can control, and WarHammer games had troops that improve with each and every battle. Merge all these elements together and you have Rage of Mages. Developed by Nival Entertainment and published by Buka Entertainment in Europe, the new Russian gaming powerhouse has given American publishing rights to the newly formed Monolith Productions, makers of the up-coming LithTech 3D engine and the latest Gauntlet style game Get Medieval.

The story of Rage of Mages occurs in the land of Allods. Mage Kings who wield tremendous magical powers controls all the land. Two kingdoms have been at war with neither side gaining any advantage over the other. In the midst of it all stands the sealed island that belonged to the Great Mage Skrakan who has erected a barrier over his island that allows everything in but nothing out. Both sides of the war thinks that Skrakan has discovered something in which will help turn the tide against their enemy. This is where you come in, your party has been chosen to partake in the quest to discover the secret of Skrakan and bring it back to help with the war effort. You are sent via a magic portal to the island where Skrakan resides but a mishap occurred in the spell and you arrive alone without your other party members (why does this situation always happen? Maybe they need to send those mages back to school).

The game is played out on a mission by mission basis, much like that of the Warhammer games. You get to choose which mission you want to partake. If the mission is successful, you get a reward, which you could use to hire troops, buy new equipment for both yourself, allies you find on the way and troops that you hire. You can get training in different disciplines to improve your character. The missions in which you partake will also not be WarCraft type missions where the basic premise is to build lots of buildings and kill everything that doesn't look like you. There will be search and rescue, find the artifact, and of course the well-loved kill anything that moves. There is no resource building involved at all. Strategic planning will be the difference between winning the mission or going home shamed. With a WarHammer like mission-by-mission play, Rage of Mages will offer branching storylines which will offer great replay value as well. Some missions not part of the main plot will only be around for you to partake for a certain time period, and if you miss it, then the mission would be gone from the mission list. It will make the player think carefully about which mission to go on and which ones not to take. For some missions might give you more treasures or artifacts to use, while others could give you less.

The missions, or quests if you will, are given to you in town. It could come from almost anywhere, the tavern, training grounds, or the equipment shop. Some may even come during a mission when you are requested to do another quest when you meet someone. These quests also help you in progressing the main plot. The game interface is exactly like that of WarCraft, point, select, click. Everything you've come to expect in any RTS game will be included into the interface including true 3D terrain capabilities and realtime lighting effects.

There will be an amazing amount of weapons, armor, potions, spells and abilities to custom your character and allies with. There will be a lot of artwork for different types of equipment your character wears, and will show up accordingly on the equipment screen. For example, if you equip your character with a blue colored steel helm and a green colored chainmail, your character paperdoll would show just exactly that. On the mission screen although the details will not be that exact, your party will still show the type of armor or weapons they are carrying. If your fighter is wielding an axe, the animation will show your fighter with an axe. The magic system will also be quite varied with 5 spheres of magic from which you can choose your spells from.