MSD's GOTY Indecision Blowout: RTS Building Blocks and the Horrors™
I don't think I can truly commit to a 'Game of the Year' so instead I'm just highlighting stuff I really enjoyed that I haven't really seen praised elsewhere.
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Cataclismo
Developer: Digital SunPublisher: Hooded Horse
Released: 07/2024 (Early Access)
Get it: Steam
Do you ever just wanna build a cool fort out of legos, man it with archers and wait till nightfall for the Horrors™ to roam in and test your construction ability? Cuz fuck dude, do I have the perfect game for you.
The Cataclismo sale pitch that got me on board was "No really, like sure it's tower defense at it's core but there's more to it than that! I promise" - I've never been into tower defense. From Rampart to poorly constructed custom levels in Warcraft and Starcraft to even modern stuff, they have never scratched an itch for me, but taking a look at the art style here and then the follow-up "well, for starters it has a Starcraft meets Lego building RTS thing going on" - it activated something in me, man.
For historical context - I used to competitively play Starcraft; both Brood War when I was younger, and then SC2 to the point where in the region-locked days I owned a second license of the game from Hong Kong so I could ladder on the Korean servers. I had a problem lmfao. Anyway I've heavily missed RTS games and so the promise that this beautiful looking game was more RTS than tower defense got me in the door.
And like, goddamn. Look at that art direction!
The game is in early access - I've found with many early access games, the campaign / story is often left behind but that doesn't seem to be the case here - Cataclismo's campaign dutifully teaches you how to play and lets you explore the game world - I really don't want to go too much into story spoilers here because it's best experienced fresh. Suffice to say; this is a fantasy world covered in an evil mist™ and at night, the Horrors™ arrive to try to kill you.
The only thing preventing the Horrors™ from obliterating the human race is a fortified city on a mountaintop, a lady with magic powers, some soldiers, and a veritable fuckton of wood and stone to build into walls or ramparts or towers.
and believe me - walls, ramparts and towers you build.
The current campaign in the game cycles between character missions (read: you control a group of units and explore a wilderness, finding limited number of wood or stone to build necessary bridges to get across the mist) and city building missions (what you'd expect from an RTS - gather resources, build structures, train units) with the caveat that there's a day / night cycle and at night, shit is scary.
On city building missions you need to balance gathering resources - mainting a good oxygen and population supply while also collecting enough wood / stone to build the necessary troops and fortifications to survive the night's onslaught - usually requiring a total of 2-3 nights survival to call it a success. You have a 'Citadel' that has to be left standing at the end, how you make that happen is up to your creativity (and the wood / stone you have available to you).
Additionally, you may find areas where the resources you need to gather are inaccessible to the workers and you have to (you guessed it) construct using your wood and stone pathways for them. The game telegraphs some of these early on but as you progress less obvious solutions become apparent and this cursed land really is your oyster to try whatever you want.
You may also run out of a resource inside the bounds of your carefully built garrison and have to re-fortify something outside (or gather what you can during the day and know it'll be ransacked at night).
All of this is really impressive; the music, the art, the gameplay all really shine but then if you toss on that the game has:
- an Endless Mode (keep defending till you die)
- a Sandbox Mode (build a fort without resource limitations and test waves of enemies)
- Steam workshop blueprints (You can build a structure out of multiple parts and save it for later as a blueprint, but then share that blueprint to Workshop for other players to use or download others' creations for your game)
- A GODDAMN LEVEL EDITOR - complete with Steam Workshop integration
Place stuff and then see how it looks in the engine:
Maybe add a wave or two of the Horrors™
This game feels like a massive undertaking by ostensibly a small team and I'm blown away by what's already live in this 'Early Access' title. Is it cheating to put an 'Early Access' title on a Game of the Year list? Probably - but remember, this isn't a game of the year list. :D