Carefully waiting out the April fool's avalanche of fake game news, we were hit with a doozy of an announcement today: a video reminder of the existence of Huxley. It's a massively multiplayer, online, first-person shooter set in a universe named for Aldous Huxley's fictional literary masterpiece Brave New World. However, this homage to our favorite book from 10th grade English stops well short of mimicking anything imagined in the novel.

Not much is known yet about life in the steampunk'd, post-apocalyptic city, except for its three resident factions, each at war with the other two: the Sapiens, Alternatives and Hybrids. These three races have evolved from traditional humankind and each has unique looks, weapons and vehicles. Huxley promises that you'll be able to pick a character, weapon and grudge - in that order - and muscle for territory and glory for your faction.

Perhaps the most ambitious use of Epic's Unreal 3 graphics engine yet, Huxley promises a persistent, online shooter universe - but massively so, following in the footsteps of developer Sony Online's shooter,  Planetside. Under the hood, the same brains and brawn that power devloper Epic's highly anticipated upcoming shooter Unreal Tournament 2007 give Huxley the stones to produce the evocative in-game shots you'll see here. It's hard to find fault with the visuals, but getting a behind-the-scenes internet network off the ground to support Huxley's massive ambitions sounds like a daunting task. We'll keep you posted, and will have a closer look at E3.