If you place some kind of weird one-trailer-per-day restriction on yourself and are currently fretting about finding Mr or Ms Right: The Extremely Brief Videogame Preview, then look no further. Clockwork Empires, the latest ball of bits and bytes from Dungeons of Dredmor developer Gaslamp Games, just got its first trailer, and it’s sending RPS’ hyper-sensitive Delight-O-Meter into a tizzy. The game is a 19th century steampunk colony builder, but the trailer reveals that it’s so very much more than the staid stew of trite aesthetic cliches that description seems to imply. Somehow, it manages to prompt tearfloods of both uproarious laughter and bitter sadness within the span of, like, a minute. Also, there are giant squid monsters. Enough of my blathering. Watch.
Clockwork Empires is almost entirely freeform. You can expand your colony along lines laid down by “The Empire,” or you can shack up with another faction/none at all. Meanwhile, as the trailer suggests, many, many, many surprises await no matter how you choose to play.
“Cosmic Horror, Factories, Booze, Science, Et Cetera: Clockwork Empires is complete with all the elements for an industrial revolution, a colonial society pushed too far will break down and unleash horrors such as cultists, marauding fish-people, axe murderers, and things darker still from Beyond the Stars.”
That’s quite a melting pot of potential madness, and I’m pretty keen on seeing how it all comes together. Gaslamp’s pristine track record doesn’t hurt either, given that Dungeons of Dredmor was more brillo than a Brillo Pad. Can it inject the same deceptively careful measure of both randomness and calculation into a sandbox city building sim, though? We shall see. It’ll be out in spring 2014.
31/10/2013 at 16:14 Sparkasaurusmex says:
This has been my most anticipated game all year. I really hope it’s great.
31/10/2013 at 19:39 Synesthesia says:
Yeah, me too. With this, prison architect and kerbal, i can be so very very happy.
Also check out their dev blog, whoever hasnt. Its excellent.
02/11/2013 at 21:22 ersetzen says:
They have a pretty great development blog with updates about their progress once a week: link to gaslampgames.com
Some pretty interesting stuff on there, at least if one has some basic interest in how they work.
31/10/2013 at 16:26 Blackseraph says:
Reminds me of those magicka delayed trailers.
Looks fun.
31/10/2013 at 16:29 lowprices says:
Looking forward to this. The basic idea of the Gaslamp guys doing Dwarf Fortress with a usable interface is attractive enough, but throw in Victorian-era cosmic horror and it becomes a must-buy for me.
31/10/2013 at 16:40 boyspud says:
If you want a Dwarf Fortress-esque game with a ui now, look up Gnomoria. Its an early access game, but theres enough of a game there to play right now (I have well over 100 hours dumped into it). As it stands its pretty good, but it doesnt quite have the depth of DF. Really looking forward to Clockwork Empires, I hope it manages to scratch that DF itch.
20/03/2014 at 18:56 mangobyte says:
Honestly, I half-expected “Fun” to be hyperlinked…
31/10/2013 at 16:33 Ergates_Antius says:
Bloody Genestealers ruining another lovely picnic.
31/10/2013 at 19:08 BooleanBob says:
Jamstealers, we call them around these parts. Always keep an adamantium rolled-up newspaper handy from about mid-August onwards.
31/10/2013 at 16:48 SuicideKing says:
Didn’t find it funny, but yeah looked interesting.
31/10/2013 at 16:57 guygodbois00 says:
An Empire without a tea kettle, samovar or some similar device is not worth having. Tea was and still is the fuel of any Empire, really. China, Japan, Russia, Great Britain, even Austria-Hungary, all tea, all the way. Those that substituted with coffee, well, history and all that…
31/10/2013 at 17:24 GameCat says:
Ok, my plan now is:
1. Drink tea.
2. Conquer the world.
Damn, I didn’t know ruling the world (or at least huge part of it) is THAT easy.
31/10/2013 at 18:21 guygodbois00 says:
Yes, we are practically half way there. Pure green for the Emperor, milk, two sugars.
31/10/2013 at 20:11 Sheng-ji says:
What heresy is this, milk in green tea, pah
31/10/2013 at 20:28 guygodbois00 says:
Why, sweet milky heresy, of course. And I dare say, sometimes there’s even lemon in it.
31/10/2013 at 18:59 Stompopolos says:
Any old Creepy British Supervillain could tell you that.
31/10/2013 at 19:35 jonahcutter says:
The good old U.S.A. has built quite an extensive worldwide empire. Coffee-fueled. Tea is a distant second in most parts. Practically non-existent in those that drive the empire-mindedness most, really.
Of course, we’re on the downside of that empire (and thus the ascendency of our truly insane into positions of power). But the fun couldn’t last forever. And one can’t really blame the coffee. Tea didn’t save that upon which the sun never set.
31/10/2013 at 20:23 guygodbois00 says:
“The faux Native Americans dumped their tea bags and lo! the ocean was boiling with tea…” – Boston Tea Party -goer
31/10/2013 at 21:22 Echo_Hotel says:
So what you are saying is that a Country’s power over it’s territories is based on their choice of chemical stimulants?
Viva Colombia! May the sun never set on her 10,000 year Empire!
01/11/2013 at 04:38 mrcalhou says:
I daresay that this particular Yank quite enjoys a good Earl Grey in the evening.
31/10/2013 at 17:33 squareking says:
Based on my research, Dungeons of Dredmor was easily more brillo than an entire Brillo factory. Might want to correct that.
31/10/2013 at 18:09 Lemming says:
It looks like a fun game, but I can’t get passed that art direction. A missed opportunity for something unique if not more characterful there, rather than ‘my first 3d model’. I’m sure someone’s going to argue how it’s deliberately bad in some kind of post-modern way, but that doesn’t really work for 3D.
31/10/2013 at 20:03 Bobtree says:
The empire’s citizens do in fact appear to be clockwork.
31/10/2013 at 18:16 Shooop says:
Lots of ambition, but can they pull it off?
I hope so. Lovecraft and gallows humor are two things the game industry can never have enough of.
31/10/2013 at 18:23 Gap Gen says:
MORE COGS ARE NEEDED.
YOUR STEAMOGRAPHERS ARE LOW ON COGS.
PLEASE BUILD MORE COGSMITHS.
YOUR STEAM WORKERS ARE RIOTING; CONSTRUCT ADDITIONAL COGS.
31/10/2013 at 21:40 dE says:
“Engaging Piston, hammering away, sir!”
“Requiring additional Lubricant.”
“Strapped on and ready to go.”
“Hehehe, something is leaking. [Pause] Yep, that’s a spill.”
“Can’t get enough of these Cogs.”
“O! That’s what the ring is supposed to do”
“This just went bump in all the right ways.”
08/11/2013 at 21:29 Drakedude says:
That last line, right there, deserves to be stolen by most of creation.
31/10/2013 at 19:02 guygodbois00 says:
“Zombies, crikey! I better get my trusty, bayonet-rifle.”
“And I’ll get me brew”
31/10/2013 at 19:04 Alphadrop says:
Chap with the tentacles, five rounds rapid.