There are a lot of exciting games coming to Steam this week – including the most intriguing building game of the year, maybe even of all time.
Just before the end of the year, things are really popping on Steam, because this week is once again full of exciting new games. The big names from last week are missing, but that doesn”t mean it”s going to be boring. Especially fans of building and strategy games will get a lot to enjoy this week.
Table of Contents
Highlight of the week: Dwarf Fortress
(Genre: Building Strategy – Developer: Bay 12 Games – Release: Tuesday, December 6, 2022)
Dwarf Fortress is the life”s work of brothers Tarn and Zach Adams, who have been working on the mega-project for over 16 years – and by their own admission are not even halfway done with it.
Don”t let the name fool you: It”s also about dwarves and building a fortress, but the building game actually wants to realistically simulate an entire fantasy world and really everything that happens in it.
With every start of the game, a game world including thousands of years of history as well as hundreds of civilisations, characters, animals and monsters is first generated – and you now have to build a base with a group of dwarves to protect yourself from all kinds of lurking dangers.
Dwarf Fortress has a huge community full of obsessive fans, in part because spiritual heirs like Rimworld have only a fraction of the complexity of this absurdly detailed simulation.
An example: In battles, not only the skills of your dwarves are included in the calculation – when a hit occurs, hit body parts and the materials of armour and weapons are also taken into account, among other things.
In addition, the game is known for its crazy stories. For example, your dwarf warrior may give birth to a child in the middle of the battlefield, pick it up and smash the skulls of attacking goblins with the newborn in her arms.
Dwarf Fortress has an extremely steep learning curve due to its high complexity, but the Steam version should make it much easier to get started with tutorials – so that hopefully even more players will be able to experience this truly fascinating project in the future.
More Releases of the Week
Monday, 5 December
(Cafe Owner Simulator): Not a week goes by without a PlayWay simulation. This time the Polish publisher makes you the owner and manager of a café.
(Space Wreck): A Fallout-inspired end-times role-playing game from an iso-perspective.
Tuesday, December 6
(Hello Neighbor 2): In this thoroughly creepy stealth game, you must once again bring the secrets of your shady neighbour to light as a nosy brat.
(Assassin”s Creed Valhalla): The latest AC series installment with a Viking scenario now makes it from Ubisoft”s Connect launcher to Steam.
(Knights of Honor 2): A 4X global strategy game set in medieval Europe with great similarities to the classic Medieval: Total War.
(Paragon: The Overprime): Epic Games failed third-person MOBA Paragon is coming back under a new developer, this time on Steam.
(Ixion): Another exciting building game, this time in a sci-fi setting – because in Ixion you are the boss of a huge space station that is in constant growth.
(Hubris): A really pretty sci-fi shooter for all VR goggle owners.
(Zombie Cure Lab): Another construction game, this time from Germany. Here you build a huge laboratory in which zombies are ultimately to be turned back into humans – but until then it takes a lot of time and even more research into new technologies.
(Chained Echoes): You love old Super Nintendo RPGs like Lufia, Final Fantasy 6 or Chrono Trigger? Then you definitely have to keep an eye on this retro role-playing game, which is programmed entirely by just one German developer named Matthias Linda.
Thursday, 8 December
(Samurai Maiden): In this JRPG, a schoolgirl is catapulted into the Sengoku era and must take on skeleton samurai and other meanies.
(Solar Ash): In the new action adventure from the Hyper Light Drifter makers, you”ll explore an alien planet where mighty beasts await.
Friday, December 9
(Choo-Choo Charles): In this survival horror game, a demonic train named Charles is stalking you. Charles has spider legs, you have a machine gun and a flamethrower. Especially our Géraldine can hardly wait for the release:
(STALCRAFT): No Starcraft clone awaits you here, but a shooter MMO in the Chernobyl zone inspired by Stalker. Despite the fact that it took some getting used to, the last open beta in October was very well received by the players. Is the next big Free2Play hit waiting here?
What new game are you looking forward to this week? Drop us a line in the comments!
