Indie developer Gaslamp Games has a new game called Clockwork Empires that’s currently in the works. A game in the city-building genre, the game takes place during the advent of a fantastical industrial revolution. Think Steampunk, and you’ll get a good idea for what to expect with the game’s setting.
The game’s lead developer David Baumgart recently posted an update on the Gaslamp Games blog with details about how they’re planning the game’s development with their construction design goals.
Some of the very interesting things to note with the game is that the structures in the game will be procedurally generated, unlike those in the Anno series or just about any other city-builder.
Here’s a breakdown of what to expect:
1. The structures themselves are going to be procedurally generated. So there is not just one model for all steel mills that you plonk down in rows – you get to make decisions about shape, layout, and decor up to a point and as much as you desire.
2. Individual factories will make specific products (vs. generic factories making abstracted production points, as in a game like Civilization). CE is about an Industrial Revolution, after all, so let’s dive in on the deep end and relish the details!
3. The choices made by players need to matter, from internal composition of the factories to their placement in the settlement as parts of a larger civil & logistical system.
4. Factories need to be identifiable by type at a glance even with structural customization and, better yet, they must be interesting to watch.
Even where buildings are concerned, people are important. Characters make a game more engaging because they build stories. And anyway, the effect of industrialization on people (rich and poor) is extremely important to what’s going on in CE.
The rest of the article talks about the game’s influences, which range from the likes of The Settlers II and Caesar III to newer titles like Minecraft and Terraria.
