Story

Across a barren wasteland, a sleeping evil crawls from the depths of the earth. At first content to slowly build their strength within a small region, the Necromancers will soon reveal their awesome power as they move to subjugate the entire land for their evil purposes.

Wielding dark magic, they have perfected the art of raising the dead and now command these terrible minions to obey their slightest whim. Amassing an army is a trivial task for those that can summon the black legions of departed souls. You must embark upon a journey to improve strength and skill, enlist powerful allies, and recover a lost talisman of ancient magic to survive the coming onslaught.

Ultimately you must seek out the lair of the Necromancers and destroy them and their undead puppets before they can carry out their terrifying plans. Are you ready?

Features

• 43 non-linear, branching missions: Rage of Mages 2 personalizes the game playing experience by allowing players to experience greater variety on their quest.
• New story set in an original realm: Players lead their party of adventurers through Arabian-style desert cities and arboreal Druid villages. Each location delivers new challenges and new foes.
• Increased replay value: Totally new multiplayer arenas support up to 16 players.
• New multiplayer map editor: A full-featured multiplayer map editor allows players to easily create their own worlds and distribute them to other gamers.
• Over 400 weapons, items, spells, objects and buildings to help adventurers in their travels.
• 80 unique foes to conquer, including hideous skeletons, zombies, Druids, shamans, and the lethal race of Necromancers. Each foe features deadly new combat abilities.
• New ally system: Players can now crush the competition by allying with Orcs and Trolls, as well as with other people.

Minimum System Requirements:

Windows 95/98®
A Pentium® 133
32 MB RAM
150 MB hard disk space
A PCI SVGA 1MB Video Card
Direct XTM 6.0
A Windows compatible sound card
A 4x CD-ROM
A 28K Modem or LAN for multiplayer.

Team

Standing from left to right: Victor Surkov , Peter Vysotin , Elena Rubanova , Evgeny Ivanov , Andrey Gulin , Yuri Blazhevich , Helen Rychkova , Andrey Fomin , Elena Churakova , Andrey Yemelianenko , Dmitry Zakharov , Mikhail Matveev , Dmitry Devishev , Pavel Epishin , Serge Orlovsky , Alexander Korabelnikov
Sitting from left to right: Alex Borzykh , Roman Kozlov , Oleg Glazunov , Alexander Dmitriev

Nival is a privately held company founded in 1996. Initially, the staff was formed from the development team of Sea Legends, published by Ocean Software. Nival started its business with localization of Sea Legends for New Media Generation.

Later on, Nival developed a project titled Allods: Sealed Mystery, published in Russia by 1C and Buka in April 1998. It was released in October 98 under the title Rage of Mages in U.S. by Monolith Productions, in U.K. and France by Microids, in Germany by CDV, and in Korea by SKC.

The key element of Nival's success is the people that work for the company. All 25 members of Nival's development team are truly devoted to computer games. Teamwork encourages everybody to contribute their best ideas, abilities and effort to the project.

Nival programmers possess extensive expertise in development of original technologies and utilizing commercially available libraries on various platforms, including Windows 98, Windows NT, and UNIX. Close cooperation with Microsoft and Intel gives Nival an opportunity to stay ahead of competition by incorporating the latest technologies into the software.

Advanced 3D technologies, as well as traditional animation techniques, are used by Nival designers to create stunning graphics. Original soundtracks are written by professional composers and sound engineers employed with Nival.

Nival positions itself as a developer of state-of-the-art games for both Russian and foreign markets. We at Nival are constantly working to improve our production process. Changes are necessary to stay ahead of competition and utilize top-notch technology. But there are just a few things about Nival that will always remain the same: reliability and uncompromised product quality.


Key Employees

Before joining Nival Interactive, many of Nival's current employees were key players for well-known Russian and international software companies such as Mir-Dialog, Animatek International, Doka, Buka Entertainment, Pilot Studios, Kirill and Mephody, and New Media Generation.

Serge Orlovsky , 27, President: During his 4 years at Mir-Dialog, Serge worked his way up from a programmer to project manager. Having contributed his strong programming skills to developing Russian Six Pak published by Interplay, he also took an active part in creating Sea Legends for Ocean Software, and later was responsible for its successful localization in Russia. Immediately after graduating from Moscow State University, where he received an M.S. degree in Computer Science, Serge founded Nival company, where he designed and managed Rage of Mages (Allods: Sealed Mystery). Currently at Nival, Serge supervises a wide range of company's activities, from product development to finance and marketing.

Dmitry Devishev , 27, Lead Game Designer, Project Leader: Dmitry possesses an extensive expertise in database and global network development programming. Before joining Nival's team, he occupied a position of a Chief programmer at the Moscow Commodity Exchange. A self-confessed computer games addict, Dmitry is one of the original founders of Nival, where he designed and managed Rage of Mages 2: Necromancer (Allods 2: Necromancer), and now supervises nearly all development stages of the upcoming projects, playing premier role in their design.

Dmitry Zakharov , 35, Project Leader: For over 8 years Dmitry has occupied leading positions in both game development and publishing companies. His background includes an M.S. degree at the Moscow State Technical University, dept. of Computer Science; 3 years at the head of Luna game development company; and 3 years as Head of Computer Games Development department for Buka Entertainment, one of the major Russian publishing companies. Dmitry now applies his thorough understanding of game development market in his role as project lead of the upcoming company's true 3D strategy game project under the codename of Allods 3: Redemption.

Andrey Yemelianenko , 37, Project Leader: Andrey brings strong managerial and game development skills to Nival. His background includes an M.S. degree at the Moscow Engineering-Physics Institute; 6 years of work in the Institute of Theoretical and Experimental Physics; and 7 years in Animatek International Inc., where he spent his last three years as chief programmer and project manager. He was responsible for the PC and PlayStation game projects, such as The Secret of the Black Onyx for Blue Planet Software and Ragged Earth for SegaSoft. Andrey now manages the upcoming Nival's strategy game project under the codename of Guardians.

Peter Vysotin , 25, Lead Programmer: Peter complements Nival's development strength with his extensive experience in game programming. A graduate of the Moscow Institute of Electronic Engineering, he came to Nival from the position of a Lead Programmer at Doka Company, where he developed the Total Control game project, published in Germany by Software 2000 and in UK by Digital Integration. As one of the original founders of Nival, Peter has been invaluable in developing Rage of Mages (Allods: Sealed Mystery) and Rage of Mages 2 (Allods 2: Necromancer), and is now continuing to take an active part in the company's product development effort.

Yuri Blazhevich , 24, Lead Programmer: Being a postgraduate of the Moscow Institute of Physics and Technology, Yuri has 4 years of high-tech experimental programming experience at the Education and Research Scientific Center at MIPhT. In his role as Allods 3 lead programmer, Yuri is committed to bringing the best of his fundamental knowledge of physics and computer science to Nival and implementing the top-end technologies into the company's new 3D graphic engine.

Evgeny Ivanov , 27, Lead Programmer: Evgeny came to Nival as an expert in cryptography and computer security systems. His background includes an M.S. degree in Computer Science at the Moscow Institute of Electronic Engineering, teaching informatics at the International Computer Camp and 3 years of security systems programming. Evgeny contributed his best efforts to developing the Rage of Mages and Rage of Mages 2 multiplayer engine, and currently is responsible for programming the new multiplayer-oriented engine for the company's new strategy project under the codename of Guardians.

Helen Rychkova , 26, Lead Artist: Helen has over 8 years of experience in computer graphics design and possesses an extensive expertise in the cutting-edge 3D graphics software. During her 3 years at Mir-Dialog, she occupied a position as a lead computer artist and took major part in designing Russian 6 Pak published by Interplay, and Sea Legends for Ocean Software. Helen is also one of the original founders of Nival. She managed work of Nival's artists team in developing Rage of Mages (Allods: Sealed Mystery) and Rage of Mages 2: Necromancer (Allods 2: Necromancer), and is responsible for the artwork in the upcoming Allods 3: Redemption.

Oleg Glazunov , 26, Lead Artist: Oleg's multifarious experience includes designing multimedia educational programs, printed editions, head pieces for television PC and PlayStation games. For three years he has occupied a position of a 3D designer at Animatek International Inc. and Russian Software Creation. With his solid educational background at Moscow Engineering-Physics Institute, he is instrumental in Nival's endeavors in designing high-quality graphics for its current and upcoming products. He is now responsible for the artwork for the company's new strategy game project under the codename of Guardians.

Nikolay Kozlov , 33, Concept Artist: Nikolay enforces Nival's art team with his huge eclectic experience ranging from painting on porcelain, forging and illustrating fairy tales to being art director and lead animator of TV commercials and computer games, including Sea Legends in Mir-Dialog. His background includes art studies at the Moscow State Pedagogical Institute and over 4 years of professional animation at Pilot Studios by Alexander Tatarsky. From the very start Nikolay has been the heart of Nival's artwork, and now continues to play premier part in the new projects graphic design.

Mikhail Matveev , 25, Sound Engineer: Mikhail's background compiles solid knowledge of both computer technologies and music. A postgraduate of Moscow State University of Electronics and Mathematics and Moscow College of Improvisational Music, Mikhail has managed the sound of over 20 multimedia projects for Kirill and Mephody and New Media Generation. Among them are the famous collection of encyclopedias, the Bible, Alice in Wonderland, to mention just a few. During his two years at Nival, Mikhail is responsible for all projects sound engineering.

Alexey Sviridov , 34, Writer: After receiving an M.S. degree in engineering at the Moscow State Technical University, Alexey gained multifarious life experience until he became a professional writer, specializing primarily in the genre of fantasy. He has three published novels, the 3rd prize in the international 'Interpresscon' nomination for the best fantasy short story. Alexey is currently responsible for nearly all writing work at Nival, from games scenarios and ideas to documentation design.

© Monolith Productions, Inc.