Looks like we are getting a sequel of sorts to Surviving Mars. Not much more is known right now other than it’s a post-apocalypse building game that’s (presumably) set in the same universe as Surviving Mars. Maybe it’s what happens on Earth after Mars is colonized?
Teaser:
Hopefully we’ll get some details on Paradox Con later this year. This is supposed to be coming in 2020.
That might be the worst teaser video ever.
Yeah, I had actually mentioned that in the OP but decided to keep my opinions out of the original topic post. I’m happy to rant about how much I hate “trailers” that don’t show any gameplay, and 20 seconds of title screen might be even more frustrating.
I hope its good, and they make the colonist portion more fun. Because thats what killed the first game for me, once I had to deal with colonists I lost interest.
For anyone who hasn’t already and wants to try the first game: Surviving Mars will be free next week on the Epic Game Store.
I would love to see a post apocalyptic Civ like strategy game - building new settlements, allying with other ones, diplomacy, searching for technology, etc.
Age of Wonders Planetfall has your back.
Nice.
That’s sort of there in a futuristic spacy way but I meant more of a Fallout/Mad Max vibe.
Early access is apparently exclusive to the Epic Games Store on the PC, too. I’m curious to see how the Paradox fan base will react.
It’s also on Microsoft’s Game Pass. Beta’s still 1 €/$. Although without the DLC I guess one will be missing an important part of the game.
This has hit early access now, and you can join in by buying the game for $20 smackers. People were also able to play it at PDXCON (I guess). I saw a bit of a Let’s Play for this and they said it was going to be out in late 2020. Doesn’t it seem super early to start the EA process? I mean, it won’t be out for over a year. Or is this the new normal?
And it’s on a store that doesn’t have reviews or forums, so there’s no easy way for me to find out what kind of state it’s in.
My thinking is that this is a very low-stakes way (no offense to the devs) for Paradox as a publisher to experiment with two things they previously haven’t done. I hope both experiments fail miserably.
Plenty of streamers playing it on Twitch. Looks like it’s in decent shape, but lots of work on systems and goals to work on.
Tim I have yet to play Surviving Mars. I’ve played plenty of Paradox titles though and enjoyed them, early bugs aside.
I a bit lost though. Why are you hoping this fails? Did I miss something bad about SM that I’m not going to like?
Sorry, I guess I wasn’t clear in my post! The two experiments I mean are selling games in early access and also giving 1 year exclusivity to Epic Games Store. I don’t hope that the game fails, I hope that this 1 year EA exclusive period fails to get the adequate sales to make Paradox consider this same route for another game in the future.
In a year’s time, assuming it’s out and not tied exclusively to EGS, I will strongly consider the game as I do any Paradox title. I liked Surviving Mars, even at launch, and the devs always struck me as good people.
Ah, okay, and I agree with you on both points.
By the way, this game isn’t actually being made by the Surviving Mars guys (Haemimont Games). It’s a different development studio (Iceflake Studios).
It doesn’t really seem to have much relation to Surviving Mars other than they both have Surviving in the title.
I’ve watched a few streamers doing Let’s Plays of this title and though there is a fair amount of technical polish (in that I haven’t seen any crashes or more than a couple of glitches going on), they’ve definitely only really worked on the early to midgame portion.
It’s early access and they’ve said it won’t come out for about a year, so most of these items will undoubtedly be addressed. And I have to think that if they reflect on the launch of Surviving Mars (where the initial game wasn’t terribly fun) Paradox will make the changes they need to make here.
The main flaws in the current game:
The basic building mechanics work fine. But a lot of small things either are broken or are not yet implemented: for instance, when you place a well, it says if you overlap it with another well the efficiency of the well goes down. Well, that’s not in the game yet. Also when you place the well (or similar buildings with an area of effect radius) they don’t show what parts of the map are occupied by similar buildings - it’s a small thing but seems pretty important.
The world map mechanism needs to be fleshed out a bit also. After you get more than say 3 specialists it appears pretty tedious to keep moving them around - and more convenience factors like “return to base” need to be added, otherwise you’re spending a lot of time schlepping them around turn by turn (and when you have 8 specialists, you have to remember each turn what you wanted each one to do).
The building upgrades aren’t more functional, they’re just larger buildings of the same type. So a mess hall operates just like a cook tent but can employ more people.
Tech tree is rudimentary
Endgame isn’t there yet. As the game stands now, after you play it once there’s very little reason to go back to it.
I think this can be a good game, and Paradox is for sure going to iterate on it, but they’ve a ways to go. Definitely keeping an eye on it, though.