Empire of the Fallen Steel

Every now and again a new idea is born in the realm of video games, and developers are quick to expand on it. Procedural level generation has become quite the widespread phenomenon a few years back, especially after Minecraft showed the world what can be achieved with a bit of creativity. Nowadays the concept has been refined and polished, even if there’s still a lot of work to do in the field.

Empire of the Fallen Steel is a sandbox game with RPG, FPS and adventure elements in which you get to build armies, choose a faction and use your abilities to conquer more territory. The game is in a pretty rough state at the moment, but there’s certainly potential here if the developer keeps at it. In fact, this could become a very popular title if everything goes according to plan.

The whole thing starts with a familiar top-down view akin to an old-school RTS, given the fact that you have to click on the map in order to move your character. However, things get interesting once you reach a town, because the game allows you to switch to a first-person view and get right down to the action. The shooting mechanics are very basic at the moment, but there’s plenty of room for improvement.

It’s worth noting that the procedural map generation is not very exciting right now, given the fact that most towns look the same and the outskirts are just vast expanses of nothingness. You can build an army by buying robots to fight for you, although you need currency in order to do so. Dungeon raiding is planned for future versions, which should allow you to get all the money you need.

Each faction in the game comes with different abilities, so it feels like your choice on the matter is important, not to mention the fact that this encourages replayability. Granted, a lot more work is needed when it comes to the actual mechanics, since the shooting feels awkward and the map exploration is slow and annoying, but then again this is a small studio with limited resources.

Empire of the Fallen Steel is not quite there yet, but it deserves a chance if you are a fan of free exploration and sandbox games. Hence, the faction gimmick and the procedural maps could be a huge hit with the crowds, at least as long as they are well integrated and refined in the meantime.