The Matrix Online Previews

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Written by BuckGB on February 15th, 2005

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Different attack types have different qualities (quick attacks can "daze" opponents to set them up for advanced attacks, for instance), but your success in the round-based battles depends on random results that are affected by your character's skill levels. With each round of combat, each time you or your enemy attacks, the game generates a number for each of you. Whoever draws the higher number successfully attacks (or defends). As you may have seen from previous videos released from the game, the hand-to-hand battles involve plenty of punching, kicking, backflipping, and other flamboyant fisticuffs you'd expect from a game based on The Matrix.

If the designers have their way, though, you'll be able to spend just as much time messing with your character's skills than you could actually playing the game. Just as in the movies, just about everything your character can do -- from creating an in-game item, to executing a devastating sneak-attack -- can all be boiled down to lines of code. Gaining a character level merely means that you have more "memory" at your disposal into which to load skills. Even your character class is nothing more than a skill that you acquire once the ones below it in the tech tree.

In addition to the meet and greet mission types, Tyndall will also send you out to eliminate people within the Matrix. My first target was an exile who was trying to undermine Zion's recruitment efforts. Other missions have you finding targets and escorting them to key locations. After Tyndall shows you a mission, you'll have a few minutes to decide whether to take it or not.

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