The MMO market has become increasingly tough arena to fight in for small, independently funded start-ups like Masthead Studios, but these Bulgarian entrepreneurs are undeterred as they develop Earthrise.

"[Earthrise is] a game that is about freedom," said Technical Director George Petrov. "[It is] not the usual fantasy MMO."

Their vision is most definitely a throwback to an era when there were many schools of thought in the MMO genre. Since World of Warcraft, companies have gravitated towards level based games that closely direct the player’s experiences and they’re almost universally fantasy. Earthrise rewinds the clock and is clearly inspired by Ultima Online, which rose to prominence a decade ago with a completely open skill-based system where players improve through using individual skills, rather than experience earned by killing monsters and completing quests.

It’s a subtle difference and a much harder system to balance, but when done correctly can provide a more organic and diverse virtual world for its inhabitants. Repeatedly throughout the interview, Petrov and Art Director Nikolay Stoyanov mentioned freedom as a core of their game.

They prefer the open skill system - where any one character can use any skill in the game rather than being limited by a class - because it allows players to experience the game and its story from different angles. For example, in WoW, a player really only has one incentive to do a quest: the reward. The experience itself is the same each time. In Earthrise, players could theoretically run through the story in different class roles, which increases replayability.