In MMOs where I spend most of my time, the big achievements are the guild completing the raid before anyone else, or the maximum level at the start of a new expansion, and although as impressive as some of these feats, they are still part of a largely linear journey that most players ultimately experience. Pax Dei is a "social sandbox" that starts immediately with early access, and it does different things.

The mainframe industry wants to create a world that "doesn't feel like a journey." There are no levels or classes, so you won't go from level 1 to level 60. "It's like where you live there."

You can find some land to call yourself or maybe join a clan and build houses, inns and shops in the village or help your comrades build a huge castle on the side of the mountain. Then you find a role: a trader, a tailor, a blacksmith or a soldier who swore to a knight, a man who served a baron, is just one nobleman in the kingdom.

"So there is no predefined path," says Hardarson. And it extends to how you discover new things. Many of the craft recipes first rote by building crafts and prerequisites, as you learn to make certain iron products by building furnaces and forging, and it includes magic in the form of divine miracles that you can throw.   

"Everything is found in the world itself," says Hardarson. "You will find new magic, new skills and new recipes in the world. And maybe it's only you who have this new magic or have found it, and things like that have spread to the player organization.

In this way, knowledge flows realistically through the world. Someone makes an incredible discovery and shares it with their clan, or their kingdom, or the religion to which they belong. Miracles are also distributed by the diocese, so becoming one of the faithful and joining the church will bring you some tangible benefits. 1. One of such miracles is the ability to make fast trips with the church. This is why God has never had to get off a taxi at 2am after spending the night with a young man. 

My conversation with the mainframe also touched on the feudal system, the player-run economy, PvP wars and the efforts I went through to make a pair of scruffy pants, so take a look at my full Pax Dei preview for more. You can also check out the MMO yourself when you launch the MMO in early access on 6/18.