Frostpunk is a great thought-provoking RTS from 11 bit Studios. I have had it on my wishlist since it first came out, but only recently picked it up on Steam. This review will go over both my thoughts on the game as well as a high level overview of the game itself.
Why This Game?
I would say in general that RTS is my preferred game genre, but I don’t always enjoy every aspect. I’m personally a slow and methodical player, meaning that combat doesn’t always suite me. In Frostpunk you get an RTS that has removed direct combat and replaced it with something I honestly find more thought provoking. Where a normal RTS you would gather resources and build an economy to support an army, in Frostpunk you do it to survive the environment.
There is no invading army, no terrorizing units raiding your villagers. Instead Frostpunk forces you to prepare and protect you city from the cold. To that end you will make choices that will make you stop and think; should children be put to work, or kept in shelters. As you progress the decisions will push the humanity of your city further. Beyond resources like wood and steel you will have to monitor discontent and hope. If the balance of those gets too out of wack then your city may reject your rule.
The Story
Frostpunk takes place in an alternate history of the British Empire of the late 1800s. This places the game firmly in the steampunk genre from a storytelling perspective. One way that Frostpunk helps the player feel immersed in the game is through taking the steampunk nature and weaving it into the story in a believable way. As you learn about the timeline and technology the creators made sure to not venture far from the roots of believable technology.
A great example of how everything is woven together can been seen just in the imagery of the people of your city. These characters aren’t just generic villagers, they have a name, a family, and a job. The pictures of the people show the kind of people hat are living through a disaster, keep going. The art style itself could tell the story without any of the cut-scenes explaining what has and is happening.
The story itself centers around the earth going through global cooling. The drop in temperature so severe that civilization begins to collapse. As an attempt to save humanity the British Empire has commissioned the construction of the generators. The generator is both a source of heat and hope for your city as the temperature begins to fall.
Gameplay
HUD
The HUD provides quite a bit of information to take in. In addition to the normal resource and population information there is also temperature, exploration, weather, and tasks. While this seems like a lot to keep track of the HUD presents it in a very succinct way.
Resources, Temperature, and Weather
Like most RTS’s you will spend a fair amount of time collecting and managing resources. The main resources in Frostpunk are coal, wood, steel, raw food, and food rations. There is also steam cores and potentially prosthesis. Steam cores are a unique resource in that you can not secure a reliable source for them in most cases. Of all the resources coal and food rations are the two most important for keeping your city alive.
In the image below you can see all the resources except for prosthesis listed across the top.
In addition to resources and time control the top bar also displays one of the antagonists in Frostpunk, the temperature and upcoming weather. The rise and fall of the temperature creates trouble for your city in the form of sickness, closed workplaces, and death. One must stay on top of development of new technologies and management of heating in order to fight back against the cold.
Hope & Discontent, Construction, Laws, and Economy
Another type of resource in a way is the Hope and Discontent of the city. Your control over those is based on decisions during encounters and the creation of laws. You can also effect them through how you maintain the city in general.
To the left of the Hope and Discontent is the Research and Construction buttons. Management of the order and timings of research can potentially decide if your city lives or dies. Construction must also be managed to balance the use of resources and citizens needed to build critical infrastructure.
To the right are the Laws and Economy. Laws can be used to unlock new buildings and abilities that can directly or indirectly effect hope and discontent. One example is to enact extended shifts, in that case your citizens will work a longer day at the cost of reduced hope and increased discontent. The economy can be used to get a better idea on the rate that resources are being collected and used. It can also be used to view the current housing situation as it relates to available beds and temperature.
The final piece of information in this section is information about the health of your citizens. As citizens get sick and gravely ill you will see a red cross above the Hope and Discontent bars. As those citizens are moved to available medical centers the number will reduce and be added to the grey cross below. The other health component is if you citizens are hungry or starved. This number will be reflected with a red fork. If your citizens get hungry enough they will eat raw food or become sick.
Everything Else
The remainder of the HUD is occupied by a Help function, Active Tasks, Population with available workforce, and the Frostland interface.
The help provides access to a very useful and extensive guide about the game, buildings, technologies, laws, and goals. As you play the game will prompt you as you go with a popup under the help icon with a link to the section relevant to the most recent event.
The tasks section lists the current tasks that you either need to accomplish, or have agreed to do through citizen requests or enacting certain laws. A common request from citizens may be to heat homes where you will agree to heat none, some, or all homes with varying effect on hope and discontent. Each task will list the requirements and a count down bar across the top. If you hover over the task you will see time left to complete the task in days and hours.
Population and Employment
The population info shows the total population of your city along with the number of unemployed citizens. If you hover over the section it will expand to show the breakdown of citizens between worker, engineers, and children. Also shown is the employment rate of each group. In the overall game screen when hovering over population you can see where citizens are employed and can click to narrow the view to specific types of citizens.
The Frostland
The final section of the HUD relates to what is happening out in the Frostland. While the game is primarily played around your generator and building up your infrastructure there, you will have the opportunity to send scouts out into the Frostland to locate other survivors or resources. From the HUD you can see the status of these expeditions. You also have the ability to switch to the Frostland view in order to direct the movement of scouts and exhibition teams. The latter group allows you to set up camps in the Frostland to supply your city with a constant flow of certain resources.
Tech Tree
The tech tree is divided into sections for Heating, Exploration & Industry, Resources, and Food, Health & Shelter. The progress through the tree is controlled by both preceding technologies along with the current level that your workshop is at.
Which technologies to research and when can have a large effect on how easy or difficult things will go for your city. Time will need to be taken to plan the order you will be researching items. A balance has to be made between providing heat, collecting resources, and exploration.
Temperature Overlay
To quickly see the status of the temperature in homes and workplaces you can toggle a temperature view by clicking the current temperature. The view will show based on color the conditions across your city. Temperatures chilly and above mean citizens will be at a low risk to get sick and not be able to work. As the temperature drops the rate of illness will go up and at some point certain workplaces will not be able to function. As locations move to freezing citizens are at risk for frostbite which increases chance for amputation or death.
Construction
Construction in Frostpunk is based around a radial grid with the origin at the generator. Distance from the generator determines how much and if a building receives heat from the generator itself. Similar to the tech tree, the construction menu is subdivided by functionality. Additionally some buildings and sections are only available based on choices made during the game. Buildings that you have resources available to build will show as solid, ones you do not as an outline.
When placing buildings they must be attached to a road that connects back to the generator to function. For buildings with area effects you will see the area and any affected items or buildings. Also highlighted will be any buildings who’s area effects will be having an effect on the building under construction.
Once placed the construction will occur based on the availability of citizens. If there are currently citizens who are not employed they will go and begin construction. If everyone is employed some may leave work to start construction or you will have to wait until after work hours for construction to occur. This is something that must be kept in mind when the construction is time critical.
Exploration
Exploration of the Frostland is carried out by Scouts sent from your Beacon. These scouts can go to locations where they may discovery survivors, resources, more locations, just information, or nothing. These discoveries are not without risk as some locations may require scouts to take actions to attempt to explore certain sites. The rewards far outweigh the risks as exploration is the only way to increase population during early and mid-game.
Scouting parties take time to reach destinations, so the order sites are searched can be important. Scouts also travel faster along paths they have already traversed, which can be used to your advantage. Some sites are important for progress for the story, but most are not. Care must be taken to balance visiting multiple locations without returning resources on the risk you may visit a site where you lose your scouting party.
The other side of exploration is through building Depots. Depots provide a set amount of a single resource on a daily basis. This can be used to augment the amount of resources that can be gathered in your city. The limiting factor on depots is the number that can be set up concurrently.
Final Thoughts
Overall this game is one I would strongly recommend. I’m currently at over 90 hours of gameplay including multiple playthroughs of the main story as well as the various other expansions. Each time I have had a different experience, whether it be due to random encounters, or choices I have made, there is always surprises. This game is post-apocalyptic survival on a cultural scale. You aren’t fighting to a save yourself, or any single person, but to save society as a whole. If you’ve ever wanted to see how you would answer the hard questions at the end of the world you should play this game. If you enjoy resource management in RTS’s then you should play this game. If you enjoy steampunk and alternative history then you should play this game.
This game is easily in my top 10 to recommend to other people. It is also likely to stay in my top 10 for the foreseeable future.