MTV.com reports that a massively-multiplayer game taking place in Africa is in development by Rapid Reality, an American startup company apparently working with John Sarpong, grandson of an exiled Ashanti king. According to MTV.com, the game play will include player-created drum music, player-customized maps, and tribes of up to 100 people be able to create their own empires. The game will reportedly be distributed over the internet, and "will be designed to run well even on the less powerful computers frequented by Africans in their countries' cybercafes."

While I look forward to playing any game based upon the culture and history of Africa, Rapid Reality's reported goal of being able to develop the game in a year or less is laughable. Pulling off a good massively-multiplayer game within that time frame would be a miracle, but based on the MTV.com article, the developers are young and inexperienced. According to the official game site, the developers are licensing a third-party MMO platform, but this still won't save the game in the content and story department.