Do you love the open world survival of Minecraft but wish you could do more? Do you wish The Sims had more town building elements? Well, Overly Complicated Games in Singapore has fixed that with their new colony simulation game, Embark.
Embark follows a group of explorers who find themselves on a strange and hostile planet. Your job is to set up the best colony in that place. Manage your colonist’s needs, their lives and relationships – as well as those pesky things such as hunger and thirst.
What In The World?
Just like Minecraft, you’ll be exploring a blocky 3D generated world (but better). In Embark there are thousands of different flora and fauna for you to discover. There are Seasons to take note of, temperature, precipitation and even the time of day. Just like most sim building games, you’ll need to manage these conditions as it will be able to help stimulate or hinder your colony.
For example, a lack of water will kill your crops, leaving your colony starving for food. That’s alright in Spring but if Winter comes early you’ll be leading your colonists towards starvation.
Embark‘s map is procedurally generated, spanning over 2×2 kilometres. As you juggle between building your base you’ll need to explore the map for more resources. But beware because the world is filled with not just plants and animals but other various factions and encounters.
Build ‘Em Up, Break Them Down
Embark’s fully destructible world allows you to build anything from small trading outposts to huge fortresses. Just send your little minions out to build everything a budding colony is going to need.
The game’s deep, intuitive building and crafting system is going to help you out with this. For building and crafting, you’re going to need to gather a large variety of materials. Build and customise your colony with anything from metal walls to stone stairs, or from a loom to a catapult.
Once your workmen or women get better they’ll be able to craft higher quality items. Remember to reward your good workers with better provisions. But take note that by rewarding one you may make their friends jealous. So that’s going to be a fun juggling act for you.
Combat plays an important role in Embark. You’ll find multiple threats out in the wild and there’s a deep combat system for you to master. Managing weapons, character skills and more. Your best bet is to build an impenetrable fort but watch out because some of those buggers can fly.
Defend, explore and build your colony in Embark. Overly Complicated Games has built upon the simulation management models of Rimworld and Dwarf Fortress. Its sole developer Adam Teo has been working on this game for the last 4 years with artist Jay Wong. He eventually started working on this project fulltime the last 2 years and it shows. The programming is deep and intricate and we foresee that Embark is going to be an enjoyable time sink.
It’s the company’s first title being released and it’s coming out on the 18th of April (that’s this Thursday) on the Steam Store. If you’d like to pick it up it’s going for SGD$22 or about RM67.
