Omerta

Hull, UK, July 2nd, 2009/ Omerta Game Ltd, publisher of Omerta, the web's biggest Mafia-themed MMORPG (massively multiplayer role-playing game) announces official launch date of the hotly-awaited new version.

From July 8th Omerta fans will finally be able to play the new version, which has taken 2 years to develop.

“Our development team has been working really hard towards this launch. Omerta 3 is packed full of exciting new features and these have been exhaustively play-tested by hundreds of regular Omerta players during the last few weeks, while we corrected and improved things. We are thrilled that we can finally launch and looking forwards to seeing the best version of Omerta yet.” comments Steve Biddick, CEO of Omerta Game Ltd.

“One of the things that make Omerta unique is the brutality of killing in the game. If another player kills your gangster, death is permanent, unlike games like WOW where you just 'magically come to life again'. In Omerta, players must create a new character and work his or her way through the ranks all over again” says Otto Adang, Omerta 3 Product Manager. “It gets really exciting when it's not just single players trying to kill each other but entire families in a big street-war. When families fight, hundreds of gangsters are shooting at each other and millions of bullets get expended. For many players the thrill of these wars is one of the main attractions of Omerta.”

“In Omerta 3 we want to keep this excitement in and add to it, while also making it fairer. A lot more depth is added to kill attempts by the addition of new items and the new bodyguards. A variety of guns and special weapons like grenades help you attack others, while motorbikes and armoured cars protect you while you are online. Offline, you can hide away in your house or villa and upgrade it with things like fences and guard dogs. The variety of items and the many ways you can train your bodyguards mean there will be huge differences between players.”

“We witnessed a situation during our beta testing where many players were chasing one guy around, who just kept surviving by the skin of his teeth and employed every trick in the book to stay alive. He travelled from city to city, kept healing himself, hid away in the safe house and sneakily switched between being online and offline. He died eventually but the whole process took several hours. Now, just image what happens when hundreds of players are trying to do this to each other and bullets fly in both directions. I can't wait to see it." adds Adang.

New weapons, like a grenade have also been added to Omerta 3 to help players attack. The addition of motorbikes and armoured cars also increase protection. Whilst off-line, players can hide away in one of the new accommodation types added to Omerta 3. There is a house or villa, which can be upgraded - it is possible to add fences and guard dogs. There is even a panic room for times when the odds are really stacked against a hunted player.

The brutal reality of a kill in Omerta can be hard to take when you have worked hard ranking your account then wake up to find it dead. This is why we made a number of changes to make things fairer and give a fighting chance to survive. Maybe even get back and punish your attackers. In Omerta 3, only players of a similar rank to your player will be able to shoot at you and you can upgrade Villa security, making you harder to kill when offline. Players can even set up sms alerts so they know you were shot... and log in to do something about it. Killing is designed in such a way that several attempts will be needed before you are dead, which means a high adrenaline chase across the game world while you fight to survive. .

The actual launch date of Omerta 3 is July 8th. Players will have opportunity to pre-register up until that date via - http://www.omerta3.com

We will award all players that pre-register for Omerta 3 with bonus items when the new version is launched. These bonus items will give players a kick-start on their journey to become the #1 Mafioso.

Omerta is free to play. The only requirements are a modest PC with an internet connection.

About Omerta -

Omerta – www.barafranca.com – began in 2003 as an amateur project, in a bedroom in Groningen, the Netherlands.

Omerta Game Ltd was founded in 2004 to manage and further develop Omerta. It now boasts a full-time staff of 18 people in four countries and a network of over 200 volunteers, spread out across the whole globe.

Omerta is available in 29 languages, all of which are updated for the forthcoming launch of Omerta 3. Regional (single-language) versions are available in Chinese, Dutch, French, German, Portuguese/Brazilian, Turkish and the 'Nordic' languages (Swedish, Norwegian, Danish and Finnish).

Apart from the International version, the Dutch, Turkish and Portuguese versions are the biggest versions.

Already more than 3.5 MILLION people have played Omerta!

Omerta players like to spend time chatting with their friends on Omerta's own IRC server. There are typically 4000 people or more logged into this.

Omerta boasts typically more than 70,000 players logging in every day to chat, race cars and kill each other, all in the name of fun!

For press enquiries please contact:

Craig Albeck

Communications Director

Omerta Game Ltd

c.albeck@barafranca.com

www.barafranca.com