Frostpunk's steamy city in the snow teased
Do you feel frosty, punk?
As you might have heard, the folks who put together the civilian survival management of This War of Mine are working on a chilly follow-up called Frostpunk [official site]. It’s set in a permanently wintry world where humans cling to life thanks to steam-powered machinery. We haven’t been able to discover much about it (and that will still be the case by the end of this post) but developers 11 Bit have at least graced us with a new trailer, offering a glimpse of where humanity has made its last stand against the nippiness.
A city! It looks very Midgar, doesn’t it? We’re still no clearer on exactly what you’ll be doing in that steamy metropolis, but it's a good bet is that there's some more people management. Here's the blurby blurb.
Become a leader of a steam-powered City, the last bastion of humanity. Oversee your society, manage resources and make difficult, ambiguous choices. But whatever you do, always remember: The City Must Survive.
11 Bit have also previously said that “its core revolves around empathy & decision-making rather than optimization and resource management” and have described it as “society survival”. So, less giving some food to Maria instead of Larry? I’m guessing there’s still going to be at least some of that.
Alec played This War of Mine and said it was like managing The Sims but under siege, which may or may not have been the feeling they were going for. I played some myself and found it good at depicting a senseless war in which you have everything to lose but no reason to fight, even if many of the mechanical cogs and management elements created a basic survival game that felt slightly removed from that message.