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Yes, it's been a loooooong time coming, but we got there. Exodus Wars: Fractured Empire is now available on Steam Early Access.

Exodus Wars: Fractured Empire is a 3D turn-based strategy game that aims to capture the essence of tabletop gaming -- specifically, the 6mm miniatures wargame, Exodus Wars -- to put you in brigade-level control of futuristic infantry and armored companies, as well as massive super-vehicles.




If you love tabletop miniatures games, I think you’ll get a kick out of finally being able to play something close to that experience on your PC. I think we’ve come closer than any other PC game as I don’t think the computer games based on tabletop IPs before us have ever really attempted to capture the freeform play that miniatures games allow. We’ve tried to do something completely different, anyway, and hopefully we're succeeding.

Find out more about the game on our Steam store page: http://store.steampowered.com/app/297270/

We want to take this opportunity to thank each and every Dakka Dakka reader who backed us, posted about us, talked about us or even just sent us good vibes -- because we could not have done this without your help.

Special thanks in particular to Yakface -- you believed in what we were trying to do right from the start.

Anyone here who backed us back in 2012 or in our alphafunding phase on FracturedEmpire.net or Desura and did not received their Steam keys earlier this week, please contact me on mark@membrainestudios.com and I'll get them to you.


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STEAM KEY GIVEAWAY!
As part of our Steam launch, Yakface has given us permission to run a Steam key giveaway here -- exclusive to Dakka Dakka! (Thanks, Yakface!)

To be in the running for one of the 10 Steam keys for Exodus Wars: Fractured Empire that we'll be giving away, all you need to do is post below with your answer this question:

"What new feature would you most want to see added to Exodus Wars: Fractured Empire?"

On 5 October, we will select 10 responders below and send them a Steam key via PM.

Thanks for reading. We hope you'll be a part of our giveaway.

 GR00V3R wrote:
STEAM KEY GIVEAWAY!
As part of our Steam launch, Yakface has given us permission to run a Steam key giveaway here -- exclusive to Dakka Dakka! (Thanks, Yakface!)

To be in the running for one of the 10 Steam keys for Exodus Wars: Fractured Empire that we'll be giving away, all you need to do is post below with your answer this question:

"What new feature would you most want to see added to Exodus Wars: Fractured Empire?"

On 5 October, we will select 10 responders below and send them a Steam key via PM.

Thanks for reading. We hope you'll be a part of our giveaway.

Well, that's really generous of you!

To put in my own answer: a character tank, with the commander visible halfway out of the upper hatch in a classic "Drive me closer" pose (spoilered below)

Looking great guys,

As for a new feature I'd like, I'd say perhaps space combat as well,

Have a campaign where you can start with a skirmish in space leading to the invasion of the planet, which changes the dynamics of the mission depending on what you accomplished in the battle above the planet.

It would be a lot of work, but it would be awesome to have on the wish list.

"What new feature would you most want to see added to Exodus Wars: Fractured Empire?"

I dont know if its in or not, but changing colours of the armies. I personally think this would go great lengths to making it a bit more like the table top. Even adding in different effects like a washed look, a drybrush look etc.

I wouldnt mind giving this a try though.

Multiple death animations depending on the weapon used. Gets hit by a flamer: catches fire and falls over. Gets hit by a missile: explodes in a ball of fire. Gets cut up in close combat: blood on the terrain. Gets hit by a vortex/gravity weapon: disappear completely.

Otherwise, units leaving footprints on the terrain like track marks for tanks, wheel marks for other vehicles, footprints for infantry etc. For unique or large units, this is a must.

Looking very interesting so far,

I think one thing I would want to see in this would be (assuming it is not already in it) city maps, as I always like some good urban warfare.

Additionally, though this is obviously a lot more effort, a third faction would be a cool addition, especially if it plays in a very different way than the current 2, such as some kind of horde army.

As your game is heavily inspired by table top war games (especially 6mm) I think it would be nice to go back to the source and have a "Amature paint mode" in the graphics options where your nice crisp model textures are replaced by an armatures best effort at painting those pesky 6mm figures.

Don't know what already is in the game, but judging from the linked trailer I would say: faction diversity. If there are only two factions and both look (or even play) very similiar, I would be very dissapointed.

I would also say more faction diversity and more factions, the game looks to be very promising! I love turn based strategy as well. More factions could definitely add to replay value.

"What new feature would you most want to see added to Exodus Wars: Fractured Empire?"

Could you please add some kind of marks on the ground after a unit drives / walks over it? <edit> It gives some weight to the unit.
The bigger / heavier it is the longer / farther it lasts (assume clean-up marks later).

I found it oddly distracting a tank running through dirt and the ground is pristine where it passed. A titan would be particularly noticeable.

This would also logically apply with the various explosions, having terrain actually deform slightly would be even more cool.
Imagine a huge titan footstep being enough of a crater for troops to find cover in! <edit> (So a mixture of painting sprites over a surface and deformation?)

One thing I always loved back in the day playing C&C and M.A.X. was building walls/fortifications and turrets - and having competitions with friends to see who could build the most impenetrable fortress. :-) So walls and fortress would be my addition.

"What new feature would you most want to see added to Exodus Wars: Fractured Empire?"


I'd love a play by mail gametype. My gaming friends and I are in the no time due to toddlers stage in our lives and the ability to take a turn and "email" it or just save the game-state would be nice. What would be especially nice is the ability to go between play by mail and real time gaming, so lets say we start a game Friday night only get halfway through but want to continue through the week by "mail" and then finish the game the next Friday.

I'd like to see unit experience. As a unit survives battles in the campaign, they receive "perks", become harder to kill or more efficient on the battlefield.

 GR00V3R wrote:
STEAM KEY GIVEAWAY!

"What new feature would you most want to see added to Exodus Wars: Fractured Empire?"

The ability to streamline turns by turning off animations if wanted. Also having a hot-seat option so friends can play against each other on one computer, vs networked or head to head requiring two computers.

Hi everyone. The competition is now closed. Thanks to everyone who responded with their ideas for what they'd like to see in the game.

I can happily say that a lot of the suggestions put forward are already in the roadmap (e.g. online multi-player and fortresses), but others weren't and we are now seriously considering these. Thank you.

Because of the quality of the responses and the fact there were only 13 responders, we've decided to give all of you a key rather than just 10. I'll PM these to each of you shortly.

Thanks for participating. Hope you enjoy playing Exodus Wars: Fractured Empire and, if you do, we hope you'll tell your friends all about it.

Great. Thanks again for the game; it looks interesting.

Looking good! It may not be compatible, but I'd like to see some sort of smoke, either deployable or from burning vehicles interfering with line of sight.

Hm, shame, Im too late... still, might as well: Mod support.
Mods add immense longevity to a game. I mean, just look at stuff like morrowind... More than a decade on, its still played, mods come out, and I still see it on shelves from time to time.

Damn how did I miss this?

The Kickstarter was unfortunate in that it landed not long after my shortlived no more kickstarters evar phase started. I'm very pleased to see this hitting steam.

More ideas for Tabletop style additions (bbw cause I came up with them before is saw the comp was closed);

Random events: proper ones and really random ones like todler/cat/dog rampage!

Civilians to be terrorised/killed//presses into service.

Multiplayer saving options, so mid way through an epic battle you can by agreement save progress to play another time i.e. The online version of the real world "let's go to the pub and finish this tomorrow".

This game needs better animations and the battlefield should be more detailed.
If doing better animations is too much work for the funds available for the project then then I would rather see a picture with a text and a sound effect describing the result of an event rather than the lame explosion effects they have right now.

Honestly I'm holding my breath right now for a 40k mod. This game seems like it would ripe for it and would actually be the pretty good, much closer to TT than DoW and less confusing than vassal.

 Tyr13 wrote:
Hm, shame, Im too late... still, might as well: Mod support.
Mods add immense longevity to a game. I mean, just look at stuff like morrowind... More than a decade on, its still played, mods come out, and I still see it on shelves from time to time.

We agree completely. We've built mod support into the framework of Exodus Wars: Fractured Empire from Day 1.

This might interest you: http://www.moddb.com/games/exodus-wars-fractured-empire/news/exodus-wars-fractured-empire-team-wants-to-know-your-mod-support-wish-list

We haven't released this functionality yet as it's slated for Full version only (we're in Early Access right now), but right now we can already support modding the game simply by changing values in the game's XML files. This will enable you to change most things from unit values to formation values and even consistency.

Hope this piques your interest. We'd love to have your support during our Early Access phase on Steam.

 GR00V3R wrote:

 Tyr13 wrote:
Hm, shame, Im too late... still, might as well: Mod support.
Mods add immense longevity to a game. I mean, just look at stuff like morrowind... More than a decade on, its still played, mods come out, and I still see it on shelves from time to time.

We agree completely. We've built mod support into the framework of Exodus Wars: Fractured Empire from Day 1.

This might interest you: http://www.moddb.com/games/exodus-wars-fractured-empire/news/exodus-wars-fractured-empire-team-wants-to-know-your-mod-support-wish-list

We haven't released this functionality yet as it's slated for Full version only (we're in Early Access right now), but right now we can already support modding the game simply by changing values in the game's XML files. This will enable you to change most things from unit values to formation values and even consistency.

Hope this piques your interest. We'd love to have your support during our Early Access phase on Steam.

Is there going to be Steam Workshop support?

 agnosto wrote:
Is there going to be Steam Workshop support?

Hopefully. We're still looking into that aspect -- integrating Steam Workshop is not trivial, as it turns out -- but at this stage it looks like we should be able to get it in.

I just saw this -- think I missed the Oct 5 draw, but that's ok

I love the concept and the trailer, guys. Early movie and screenshots look good. To me, I like to play TBS games solo (they're just too long for multiplayer, and I like to stop and come back). The single most important thing is smart AI; I get tired of TBS solo games where the computer has overwhelming forces to compensate for horrible stupidity.

You're not alone. It's our understanding that most strategy gamers like to play solo, which is why we're investing so much effort in our AI (it could be improved, and of course will be, but it already gives players a decent challenge).

Talys wrote:I get tired of TBS solo games where the computer has overwhelming forces to compensate for horrible stupidity.

Completely agree. Not only are our Skirmish games all balanced points-wise, but each of the campaign missions are also balanced, from 1,000pts each for the first mission, and then slowly staggered up with more points available in each mission to a 5,000pts each finale.

When we said we're trying to capture the essence of tabletop gaming, we really meant it. Balanced points systems and army list building are cornerstones of the miniatures wargaming experience, so these things feature prominently.

Awesome news with the mod support, really looking forward to this now!

Yay!

Please, by all means, tell a friend!