User:OceanHok/sandbox/games

Development

Frostpunk was developed by Polish developer 11 Bit Studios, the company behind This War of Mine. Codenmaed Industrial, it was described the team as a significant "step-up" when compared with the studio's past efforts, with all 60 people in 11 Bit working on the project. As Frostpunk was a larger project with more complicated gameplay systems, the team had to crunch towards the end of the game's development.

The unexpected success of This War of Mine changed the studio's philosophy, with it focusing to create what it called as "meaningful entertainment". The team felt the seriousness and the hard themes explored in This War of Mine resonated with players and wanted their next game to carry similar themes. It success also allowed the studio to be more ambitious with the game's scale and scope, with the game exploring issues faced by socieity as a whole instead of the ones faced by individuals. The team wanted the experience to be meaningful and memorable for players, one that will prompt players to "ask questions about yourself, about society in general, and the dynamic we currently see today in the world". Lead designer Kuba Stokalski positioned the game as an experience exploring how much willing players are to "sacrifice" their morals and ideals to achieve a better outcome in the game. While the game is set in a fictional, futuristic setting, the citizens were ultimately grappling with modern-day social issues in a different context. The team was inspired by the events in the 19th century, which Stokalski as "a period of social stratification with masses of the workers", the Luddites rebellion against automated machinery, and the rise of artificial intelligence in modern day.

Stokalski further stated that the team was inspired by early polar exploration, the Andes flight disaster, as well as the tragic events surrounding mountineers such as Joe Simpson and Aron Ralston. The team also explored the transformation of human psyche during sustained stress, with the team researching the psychological status of people working on the International Space Station and at research stations in Antarctica. The team turned these experiences into playable systems, namely the hope/discontent meters shown in the game's user interface. The hope/discontent meters serve as an aggregation of the overall satisfaction and mood of each individual citizen in New London. The discontent meter reflected citizen's responses to laws and the player's handling of societal matters. The hope meter was intrdocued after the team identified it as an essential driver for human survival in cases of adversity, after reading reports about accidents and other near-death experiences. The player, therefore, is tasked to give the citizens of New London "reasons to live", instead of treating them merely as animals struggling for survival. Players must balance hope and discontent or they will lose the game.

The game's winter setting was inspired by Ice, a novel by Jacek Dukaj. However, harsh weather was only one of the threats to New London. Its main campaign had a three-act structure. The first act teaches the players the basics of survival; the second act tasks players to grapple with internal conflict and societal turmoil in a divided city; while third act challenges players to survive a huge storm, whereas players have to make tough decisions in order to survive. The development team reiterated that Frostpunk was not an sandbox city-builder. It was a story-driven game about about "politics" and "being a leader". The team once considered allowing players to continue building their cities freely following the great storm, but this plan was scrapped as they felt that it was anti-climatic. The team wanted the game to end after the big climax was resolved, similar to a novel.

One of the early design goal was to faciliate player's decisions and enable them to shape and guide the game's society. The team implemented an early system in which citizens in the city will be faced with a situation and the players can react by choosing one from several choices to resolve the issue. To increase player's agency, the team subsequently changed it to the law system which allows players to pass new regulations actively. One of the themes the team wanted to reflect were creeping normality. Laws of similar nature are placed in a sequence. While early laws may only result in small change in the status quo, subsequent laws passed will be more aggressive and resulted in significant consequences. Players may choose to make small concessions that was against their personal belief, in an attempt to achieve a better outcome, though this may create a snowball effect forcing players to even larger compromises in the future. The content of the laws are inspired by historical events. For instance, the use of child labourer was prevalent during the Victoria era, and Russia had a history of adding sawdust to food during times of hardships. The team spent an extensive amount of time adjusting the moral dilemmas faced by players so that they would not be too subtle for players to notice, or too exaggerated to become comical. Choices in the game were often morally grey, though the game will not actively judge or comment on any of the choice made by players.

Release

The game was announced in August 2016. The developers were initially targeting a release in late 2017, but it was delayed until 24 April 2018. The game was unable to support official mod support due to technical limitations. The game was released for the PlayStation 4 and Xbox One in October 2019. The game was developed using an internal game engine named Liquid Engine, though it will be the last game to use the engine as it presented technical challenges for console porting. Ports to iOS and Android were developed by NetEase Games. The mobile versions, titled Frostpunk: Beyond the Ice, added multiplayer functionality such as Guild, enabling players to trade between each other as well as a variety of minigames. Beyond the Ice was be published by Com2uS on October 29, 2024.

11 Bit Studios supported the game with downloadable content. A free scenario named "The Fall of Winterhome" was released on September 2024. An endless mode, which allows players to build and expand their city without being constraint by the narrative, was released November 2018. It has two difficulty modes: Serenity, in which harsh weather events occurred less frequently, and Endurance, which was more difficult than the base game as random parts of the city will shut down. A festive DLC pack named A Christmas Carol was released in December 2018, adding a new Christmas-themed quest and festive buildings to the game's endless mode. The first of three expansion pack for season pass owners, The Rifts, was released on August 27, 2019, adding a new map to the game's endless mode and introducing new gameplay features such as the ability to construct bridges. The second pack, titled The Last Autumn, was released on January 21, 2020. As a prequel to the main game, players must build an outpost in Site 113, before the location is overwhelemed by the storm. The final pack, titled On The Edge, was released on August 20, 2020, introducing a new scenario revolving an outpost which must rely on supplies from New London to survive. All three paid DLC packs were released for consoles on July 26, 2021 alongside a "Complete Edition" for the game.

Reception

• Vice
• Culprit of climate change
• Washington Post
• Survival themes and city-building games
• Treatment of disabled people
• Legacy on city-builders
• Best Sims of 2018