After a long lull of indifference and half-finished rubbish, the troublesome genre of the Massively Multi-player Online Game is finally gearing up to look interesting once again. Everquest 2 is now a huge, bump-mapped lump on the horizon; Star Wars Galaxies is tempting us with Jedi Wookiees and an array of impressive Jawas; Eve Online is dangling beautiful starships among the glowing nebulae... Even Sony's Planetside is threatening to bring real-time action to a persistent sci-fi world, with beta-testing starting this very month.

But now there's another contender in this high-concept arena - and an unusual-looking one at that: the ambitious progeny of an outrageously successful bunch of hobbyists from Nottingham. They're the chaps who make and sell toy soldiers. Yes, it's that blatantly British wünderkind of gaming on the high street, Games Workshop.